Vinod Khosla

Khosla was born on January 28, 1955, in Poona (now Pune), India. He grew up in a military family and as a teenager became interested in entrepreneurship through reading electronics magazines; in 1976 he received a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi.⁠[1][2]

He then went to the United States to study, earning a master’s degree in biomedical engineering from Carnegie Mellon UniversityCarnegie Mellon UniversityCarnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It grew out of the Carnegie Technical Schools, founded with funding from Andrew Carnegie in 1900, which were renamed the Carnegie Institute of Technology in 1912 and took the present name after merging with the Mellon Institute in 1967. The university is known for computer science, robotics, engineering, and the arts, and has campuses in Qatar, Silicon Valley, and Rwanda. As of September 2025, it enrolled 16,582 students. Its current president is Farnam Jahanian. On September 30, 2026, the university announced a $3 billion gift from Ken Griffin and plans to build a new campus in Miami.Open the full entry and, in 1980, an MBA from Stanford UniversityStanford UniversityStanford University is a research university in California founded by Leland and Jane Stanford in 1885 and opened in 1891.Open the full entry. This education spanning engineering, medical technology, and business management preceded his computer ventures.⁠[3][2]

After finishing business school, Khosla co-founded Daisy Systems. In 1982 he co-founded Sun Microsystems and served as its founding chief executive officer, building a workstation business based on open systems.⁠[2][3]

Stanford’s profile summarizes Sun’s early direction as open systems and commercial RISC processors, a different path from the computer businesses of the time that relied on proprietary architectures. Sun’s early financing also gave him a professional connection with the investor John Doerr.⁠[2]

In 1986 Khosla joined Kleiner Perkins, turning to venture capital and company incubation. Companies Stanford lists him as having been involved with include Nexgen, Juniper Networks, and Excite; these are projects from his career and cannot be taken as current holdings.⁠[2]

Khosla Ventures’ profile of him records that in 1995–1996 he worked with Pradeep Sindhu to incubate Juniper Networks, supporting the development of high-speed TCP/IP routers for public networks.⁠[3]

In 2004 he founded Khosla Ventures. The fund’s early focus included biorefining, solar power, batteries, and other clean technologies, and it later also invested in software, robotics, health care, and artificial intelligence.⁠[2][3]

He calls his way of helping founding teams build companies “venture assistance,” emphasizing operational support beyond investment. His official biography lists early investments such as OpenAIOpenAIOpenAI is an artificial intelligence research and product organization founded in 2015 that develops the GPT model series, ChatGPT, Codex and a developer API, and conducts research on image, speech, video and intelligent agents. After its 2025 restructuring, the nonprofit OpenAI Foundation continues to control the for-profit OpenAI Group PBC. Its growth has involved large-scale fundraising and compute partnerships, and has also been accompanied by controversies over governance, copyright, privacy and AI safety.Open the full entry, Stripe, DoorDashDoorDashDoorDash is a local commerce platform co-founded in 2013 by Tony Xu and others that connects consumers, merchants, and delivery couriers, with its business expanding from restaurant delivery to groceries, retail goods, merchant software, and on-demand logistics. The company went public in 2020, and its businesses include Wolt, Deliveroo, and SevenRooms.Open the full entry, and Commonwealth Fusion Systems; the investing entity, holding status, and returns of each deal must still be assessed separately.⁠[3]

In 2008, companies affiliated with Khosla bought property near Martins Beach and then restricted use of the road leading to the beach, prompting litigation over public access. The Surfrider Foundation sued in 2013; its case record notes that on October 1, 2018, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the owners’ appeal, leaving in place the ruling that closing the existing access required a coastal development permit.⁠[4][5]

In 2011 Vinod and Neeru Khosla joined the Giving Pledge, committing to devote the majority of their wealth to philanthropy during their lifetimes or through their wills. This is a pledge to give and does not mean the full pledged amount has been disbursed.⁠[6]

On November 9, 2014, the biofuel company KiOR announced that it had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and had accepted an asset purchase bid from a Khosla-affiliated party, subject to competitive bidding and court approval. The announcement also said the affiliated party planned to provide up to $15 million in debtor-in-possession financing, and that common shareholders were not expected to receive any distribution; this is not equivalent to Khosla himself going bankrupt, nor can his personal investment losses be directly inferred from it.⁠[7]

In March 2019, when OpenAI introduced its limited partnership structure, it listed Khosla Ventures as one of its investors. Khosla Ventures’ official biography says the firm became OpenAI’s first venture capital investor in 2019; this investment is part of the firm’s institutional investment history.⁠[8][3]

On January 6, 2020, the California State Lands Commission and the Coastal Commission filed a separate lawsuit, arguing that the public had acquired a right of access through long-term use and seeking restoration of full public access. Documents for the State Lands Commission’s August 25, 2026, meeting still listed the related case among litigation matters; the government’s claims and the earlier permit ruling should be understood separately.⁠[4][9]

In May 2024, Khosla gave a talk titled “Plausible Tomorrows,” discussing the technological future and the role of entrepreneurs. The talk was published by Khosla Ventures and represents his assessment of future developments.⁠[10]

In January 2025, he co-wrote an article with Bob Mumgaard, co-founder of Commonwealth Fusion Systems, arguing that nuclear fusion could provide clean, steady electricity and support the energy supply needed by industry and artificial intelligence. The article’s description of commercial power plants in the 2030s is the authors’ expectation, not an accomplished fact of power generation.⁠[11]

On September 3, 2026, the Seattle Seahawks announced the completion of the team’s sale to the Khosla family, after NFLNFLThe NFL (National Football League) is a U.S. professional American football league of 32 clubs. Founded in 1920 as the APFA and renamed in 1922, it is organized into the AFC and NFC, with the season culminating in the Super Bowl.Open the full entry team owners approved the deal on August 26. Vinod serves as Chair, Neeru as controlling owner and chair of the team’s charitable foundation, and Neal as vice chair; the deal includes other co-owners.⁠[12]

On September 14, Khosla published an article on tax reform in the AI era, arguing for adjusting capital gains preferences, supporting workers affected by automation, and exploring low-cost public services. He presented the degree of labor displacement, the scale of tax revenue, and policy timing as forecasts and proposals, and acknowledged that the range of estimates was wide.⁠[13]

Khosla Ventures official profile: https://www.khoslaventures.com/team/vinod-khosla (opens in a new window); X: https://x.com/vkhosla (opens in a new window). His verified account links to Khosla Ventures and posts views on technology, investment, and public policy.⁠[3][14]