VC Heavyweight Sequoia Names Roelof Botha As New Global Leader

Sequoia Capital has a new global leader in veteran investor and PayPal alum Roelof Botha.

The heavyweight venture capital firm has tapped Botha to serve as Senior Steward of its global brand and operations, replacing Doug Leone. The move is effective July 5, with Leone continuing as a general partner in Sequoia’s existing funds.

In an interview, Botha and Leone said the move was the result of a two-year transition process pegged to Leone’s 65^th birthday on July 4, and which has included hiring a global CFO, head of compliance and CIO. For Botha, the move represents a gradual journey from investor to mentor to leader, he says, all with the same goal: “to leave the partnership in a better place than we found it.”

“There’s a phrase Doug has, that the Ford Foundation has been a client of Sequoia longer than I’ve been alive, and they’ll be a client long after I’m gone,” says Botha. “We’re caretakers, we’re here to be of service.”

Botha, 48, made a name for himself at PayPal, the online payments pioneer he joined in 2000, and where he served as chief financial officer. The grandson of South African politician Pik Botha, he joined Sequoia the year after PayPal’s IPO in 2003. A thirteen-time Midas List member, Botha ranked No. 9 in 2021. He’s invested in companies including Instagram, MongoDB, Square, YouTube and 23andme; more recently, he backed video meetings startup Mmhmm. When former Midas List No. 1 Jim Goetz stepped back from the firm in 2017, Botha became the sole leader of Sequoia’s U.S., and now U.S. and Europe, operations, which he will continue to lead.

What power Botha will exactly wield is not so clear-cut. As Senior Steward, Botha’s mandate is to “set the overall tone” and oversee global compliance, finance and culture, the firm says.

But Sequoia operates differently from some venture capital firms that centralize their global investments with one group of funds. The U.S. and Europe funds operate alongside Sequoia China, India and Southeast Asia funds, Sequoia Heritage (a wealth manager) and Sequoia Capital Global Equities (a crossover fund with public company positions); each is led by its own managing partner responsible for fundraising from a distinct group of limited partners. Sequoia’s own partners invest in each other’s funds. Sequoia China founder Neil Shen, another former Midas List No. 1, is now the firms’ only Steward under Botha.

The U.S. business, which expanded to Europe in 2020, also operates differently within Sequoia itself: in October, the firm announced a single fund, the Sequoia Fund, that doesn’t operate under traditional decade-long fund cycles, and instead operates one large, untimed fund that allocates money to individual funds. In February, the firm unveiled one such fund focused on crypto.

Leone’s step back comes after a multi-decade run atop Sequoia’s global operations. Leone and fellow billionaire Michael Moritz had taken the reins from firm founder Don Valentine in 1997; Moritz stepped back from his administrative leadership duties after a medical diagnosis in 2012. An immigrant originally from Genoa, Italy, Leone brought a no-nonsense, plain-talking salesman’s approach to arguably Silicon Valley’s most storied venture capital firm, as detailed in a 2014 Forbes cover story. Leone also set a culture of results at Sequoia – embodied by Botha, he says, but applicable to Leone himself, as the investor led investments in Medallia, RingCentral, ServiceNow and Nubank for Sequoia over the years.

Leone’s biggest challenge running Sequoia, he says now, was “how to turn acquaintances into first cousins,” referring to Sequoia’s partners in different geographies. That meant working closely with Shen to build out Sequoia’s China practice and tie it back to the U.S., importing lessons from its India fund, and other largely globalizing efforts. More recently, Leone had to guide those efforts through a presidency unfriendly to such trends (Leone backed, then later renounced, President Trump), and more recently, the effects of a global pandemic. Leone leaves the top role an optimist about global company formation, he says.

“Yes, the world is changing, but I think it will still benefit from more globalization,” Botha adds. “it may vary by country.” Adds Leone: “There’s always a forecast that global trade is going to slow down – I’ve yet to see it.”

Botha’s heir-apparent status was clear within the firm for the past five years, Leone says. “It was obvious to everybody that this was the way to go. It was extremely painless,” he adds. Sequoia’s operations under Botha, meanwhile, shouldn’t look that different, he says. “There should be little visible change in the partnership,” he says. “But our culture is a living and breathing thing, as it should be in order to evolve.”

Under Botha, Sequoia will look to continue to expand and evolve its offerings, all without losing sight of what has made the firm successful to date. It’s a line to walk carefully that Botha and Leone says their partnership obsesses about in meetings and conversations about what could put them out of business, including “pre-mortem” exercises imagining a future in 2030 where Sequoia has failed. “I’ve created slides I’ve shown God knows how many times that it’s better to be a pirate than to join the navy,” Leone says. “I am shameless in re-flashing those slides and bringing it up again.”

How long is Botha signed up to lead Sequoia? There’s no fixed time limit, he insists. As for how Botha will make his mark – the investor grins, but divulges nothing, when asked about the firm’s next big changes.

As for Leone, the investor says he’ll remain on boards of directors for Sequoia and is joining the board of a department at Stanford University in upcoming months. He’s also picked up golf during the Covid-19 pandemic and has 10 guitars, a piano and a drum set to fill any time not spent traveling or with his seven grandchildren, all nearby in the Bay Area.

“I think that’s plenty,” says Leone. “And it’ll be a happy day when Roelof calls and says, ‘can you help?’” he adds. “I’m sure I’ll get those calls. But if they come too often, I’ll say, ‘Roelof, I’ve got seven grandchildren,’ and I’ll give him the whole story again.”