Dan Levitan

Meet Dan. He’s a transplant from New York. You’ll know this the second he says “cawfee.” But he lives in Seattle now, and he brought his 25 years of experience with him. And while he spent those years in the venture capital and investment-banking world (specializing in consumer and retail business), please don’t call him an “ex-investment banker.” We’ll leave it at that. Anyway, in 1998 Dan saw an opportunity to help innovative companies reach their full potential. That’s when he launched Maveron with some guy named Howard Schultz, chairman, president and chief executive officer of some company named Starbucks Coffee. Dan has led many Maveron investments, including Cranium, Potbelly Sandwich Works, and Pinkberry, and has directed a number of successful exits within the last 10 years, including Auctionpay (acquired by Global Payments Inc. NASDAQ: GPN), Capella Education Company (NASDAQ: CPLA), Cranium (acquired by Hasbro NASDAQ: HAS), Quellos (acquired by Blackrock NASDAQ: BLK), Good Technology (acquired by Motorola NASDAQ: MOT), and Shutterfly (NASDAQ: SFLY). He currently serves on the board of directors for Internet REIT, Kinetix Living, NextFoods, Pinkberry, Potbelly Sandwich Works, The Motley Fool, and Trupanion. Dan is also a board member for The Rock Center for Entrepreneurship at Harvard Business School. He enjoys helping future entrepreneurial leaders, and has participated as a judge and mentor for several years in the annual Harvard Business School Business Plan Competition. Incredibly, Dan has personal time. He devotes that to his wife and two daughters. He also loves Duke basketball, which we don’t hold against him. But we have to give him props: he’s climbed Mount Kilimanjaro once, and Mount Rainier twice, solidifying his love for Marmot and the Pacific Northwest. Dan graduated from Horace Mann School, and received a BA, magna cum laude, from Duke University and an MBA from Harvard Business School. Works with: Internet REIT (iREIT), Kinetix Living, NextFoods, Pinkberry, Potbelly Sandwich Works, The Motley Fool, TheWrap.com, Trupanion.