Dell resurrects venture arm as part of corporate transformation

More than a decade after winding down its corporate venture arm, Dell Inc. is about to resume venture investing and has hired a long-time Silicon Valley venture capitalist and a female entrepreneur to help.

Jim Lussier, a former general partner at Norwest Venture Partners in Palo Alto, Calif., has been named managing director for Dell Corporate Ventures, VentureWire has learned, while Ingrid Vanderveldt, a former CNBC host who has started and sold several companies, including one backed by Dell executives, is Dell's first entrepreneur in residence.

Over time, Dell plans to establish the entrepreneur-in-residence program as a separate business inside the company with its own resources and budget and will hire EIRs in nine other countries -- Canada, Brazil, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Australia, Japan, China and India, Vanderveldt said.

"You will see the emergence of Dell's focus on business applications, and it's really exciting to me, because it changes the kinds of conversations Dell will have with the market...and how they can partner with clients to increase revenue," she said. "There's a huge push with the cloud."

Venture firms often hire entrepreneurs in residence as a way to find out about promising new companies that they might otherwise miss and to keep talented entrepreneurs in the fold.

Some public companies, including Yahoo Inc. and Google Inc.'s Google Ventures, have named entrepreneurs in residence too.

But female entrepreneurs in residence, like female entrepreneurs, are still rare in technology, and Vanderveldt praised Dell for working to advance women and for hiring her in a field where "guys are the safe bet."

Vanderveldt joined Dell in August and is working on a business that she said will be of value to Dell in addition to developing the EIR program, evaluating possible investments and acquisitions for Dell and representing Dell at events.

Her tenure has already been extended from six months to at least a year because the job has turned out to be so big -- she said she's now working with about 30 people inside the company in addition to two external vendors.