Thomas Perkins (businessman)

Thomas James Perkins (January 7, 1932 – June 7, 2016) was an American businessman and venture capitalist who was one of the founders of the venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins.

Perkins received a B.S. in electrical engineering and computer science from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1953.

He earned an MBA from Harvard University in 1957.

While attending MIT, Perkins joined the Delta Upsilon fraternity.

Perkins was mentored by Georges Doriot.

During the 1960s, he also started University Laboratories, which was later merged into Spectra-Physics.

At University Laboratories he was the co-developer of the first low-cost He-Ne laser, having had the idea of how to directly integrate the laser cavity mirrors inside the plasma tube.

In 1963, he was invited by Bill Hewlett and David Packard to become the administrative head of the research department at Hewlett-Packard.

He was the first general manager of HP's computer divisions, credited with helping shepherd HP's entry into the minicomputer business.

In 1973, with Eugene Kleiner, he founded Kleiner Perkins, one of the first Sand Hill Road venture capital firms.

Later, Frank J. Caufield and Brook Byers joined the firm, eventually becoming named partners.

Perkins was a director at Applied Materials, Compaq, Corning Glass, Genentech, Hewlett-Packard, and Philips Electronics.

He was chairman of Tandem Computers, from its founding in 1974 until its 1997 merger with Compaq.

Perkins was also chairman of Genentech from 1976 until 1990, when it merged with Roche Holding Ltd.

After she died in 1994, he married romance novelist Danielle Steel in March 1998; her book The Klone and I (ISBN 0-385-32392-1) was about their friendship.

In 1996, Perkins was convicted in France of involuntary manslaughter arising from a yacht-racing collision and was fined $10,000.

They separated in August 1999 and were later amicably divorced.

During the HP/Compaq merger fight in 2001, Perkins was a member of the Compaq board and an outspoken supporter of the merger.

He joined the HP board of directors in the merger, retired, and officially rejoined the HP board days before Carly Fiorina was forced to resign from her posts as chairman and chief executive officer of HP.

Perkins led efforts to force Fiorina out.

Perkins resigned from HP's board on May 18, 2006, over the actions taken by the board's chair, Patricia C. Dunn, to ferret out the board-level source of media leaks using methods Perkins considered unethical and possibly illegal.

HP gave no cause in the SEC-required 8-K filing, and according to Perkins refused to amend the filing to indicate his reasons for resigning.

In response, Perkins disclosed his reasons publicly, triggering an SEC investigation and significant media interest into HP's leak-finding activities.

Perkins's residential phone records were obtained through a method known as pretexting.

AT&T confirmed that someone pretended to be Perkins, using his phone number and his Social Security Number.

HP confirmed that the investigative firm they hired used pretexting to obtain information on the call records of the directors.

HP's investigation found that Dr. George Keyworth was the source of several leaks.

At the May 18, 2006 board meeting, Keyworth admitted to leaking information but refused to resign after the board passed a resolution calling for his resignation.

HP's board decided on August 31, 2006, to not renominate Keyworth for another term as director.

The Securities and Exchange Commission and the State of California began inquiries into the methods used by HP to investigate its directors.

Perkins sat on the board of directors of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation along with Viet D. Dinh.

Dinh represented Perkins in the HP board affair.

Perkins was the subject of a 2007 60 Minutes special titled "Captain of Capitalism", which focused on his memoir and featured a tour of his yacht.

In July, 2011, Dinh and fellow News Corp. board member Joel Klein took over the investigation of the News of the World phone hacking affair and related Corporation issues.

One business commentator, noting Perkins' prior experience with phone-hacking in the HP scandal, speculated that Perkins "may be [was the] best hope" as News Corp. sought to work out of its phone-hacking scandal.

He was also featured in the documentary film Something Ventured, which premiered in 2011.

Perkins did not stand for reelection to the News Corp board for the fiscal year of 2012.

, Perkins was worth an estimated $8 billion He had two children, with his first wife, the late Gerd Thune-Ellefsen.

In January 2014, the Wall Street Journal published a letter from Perkins that compared the "progressive war on the American one percent" of wealthiest Americans and the Occupy movement's "demonization of the rich" to the Kristallnacht and anti-semitism in Nazi Germany:

"Writing from the epicenter of progressive thought, San Francisco, I would call attention to the parallels of fascist Nazi Germany to its war on the 'one percent', namely its Jews, to the progressive war on the American one percent, namely the 'rich.'"