Danny Schultz graduated from Columbia University with a degree in economics before becoming a senior banker with Lehman Brothers in the Equity Capital Markets groups in New York and London.
From there, he co-founded his startup Atlantic Venture Partners, now known as Gotham Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm in NYC within the Draper Fisher Jurvetson (DFJ) Global Network – the largest venture capital network in the world..
Around the mid-1980s, Schultz was exposed to the Israeli tech scene. This early experience is reflected in Gotham’s current focused investments, which include information technology startups in the Northeast U.S. and Israel.
Schultz gravitates to creative and energetic entrepreneurs who seek to disrupt the status quo. His investing is focused on e-commerce, digital media, fintech, mobile and the enterprise. Currently, he is responsible for Gotham’s investments in Yipit and Pickie – e-commerce companies that also thrive on data, another area Schultz’s sweet spot.
Schultz enjoys helping young VCs and entrepreneurs succeed (and no future tycoon is too young, as evidenced by this presentation he gave to his son’s elementary-school class in 2009). He is also active with the Kauffman Fellows Program and Endeavor Global, and co-chaired INGENUITY 2012, New York’s premier startup venture conference.. He also likes playing hockey and lives by the quote, “Don’t skate to where the puck is, skate to where it is going to be.”
VC Firm:
Co-Founder and Managing Director of Gotham Ventures (founded in 2000)
Sector Focus:
E-commerce, digital media, fintech, mobile technologies, network infrastructure
Selected Investments:
For Gotham Ventures:
Yipit
Pickie
XOsoft (aquired by CA)
Pivot (aquired by the CME Group)
Massive (acquired by Microsoft)
Personal investments:
SMARTS (acquired by EMC)
Insulair (acquired by Georgia Pacific)
Active Impulse Systems (acquired by Phillips)
Passlogix (acquired by Oracle)
Boards:
NYC Seed advisory board
Magnolia Broadband
Panvidea
Pivot Solutions
Seamless Receipts
Totsy.com
ViVOtech
Worktopia
Yipit
Expertise areas:
Startups, entrepreneurship, technology, digital and social media, e-commerce, enterprise software, finance, data
Blogs, Websites & Twitter:
Memorable quotes:
On his investing strategy: “We don’t like big data; we like smart data. You gotta know what to do with it, you have to know how to make it valuable for your customer, and that’s really the key.”
On what he looks for in an entrepreneur: “We like to see people who have been able to take an idea and actually build something with that vision. It doesn’t necessarily take a lot of capital to do that. We like innovative entrepreneurs that are going after big opportunities and aren’t afraid to fail.”
