As a venture capitalist and entrepreneur, Peter has been involved with some of the most dynamic companies to emerge from Silicon Valley in the past decade. Peter’s first start-up was PayPal, which he co-founded in 1998, and led as Chairman and CEO. Peter’s tenure culminated in PayPal’s sale to eBay for $1.5 billion in 2002. After the eBay acquisition, Peter founded Clarium Capital Management, a global macro hedge fund. Peter also helped launch Palantir Technologies, an analytical software company, and serves as the chairman of that company’s board.

Before launching Founders Fund with his PayPal partners Ken Howery and Luke Nosek, Peter was an active venture capitalist in his personal capacity, funding companies like Facebook, where Peter was that company’s first outside investor and director. Peter’s contributions to technology, entrepreneurship, and finance have been widely recognized, including by the World Economic Forum, which honored Peter as a Young Global Leader, and by BusinessWeek, which named him one of the 25 most influential people on the Web.

Peter is also involved with a variety of philanthropic, academic, and cultural pursuits. He serves as a primary supporter of the Committee to Protect Journalists, a group that promotes press freedom worldwide; the Machine Intelligence Research Institute, which seeks to foster the responsible development of advanced computing technologies; and the SENS Foundation, a medical charity dedicated to extending healthy human lifespans. Peter remains active at his alma mater, and has taught at Stanford Law School, in addition to serving on the Board of Overseers of the Hoover Institution at Stanford.

Peter received a BA in Philosophy from Stanford University and a JD from Stanford Law School.

Ken Howery is a Founder and Partner at Founders Fund.

While at PayPal, Ken helped raise over $200 million in private financing, worked on the company’s public offerings, and assisted in the company’s $1.5 billion sale to eBay. Before launching Founders Fund, Ken was a member of the research and trading teams at Clarium Capital Management, as well as a partner with Peter Thiel in his private venture investing, helping Peter diligence deals, including Peter’s initial Facebook investment. Ken received his BA in Economics from Stanford University. Ken is also a member of the Council on Competitiveness and the Selection Committee of the World Economic Forum Technology Pioneers Program. In August 2010, VC Journal named Ken one of the Top 10 VCs Under 35, and in March 2012 World Economic Forum named him a Young Global Leader.

Luke Nosek is a co-founder of PayPal and served as the company’s VP of Marketing and Strategy.

While at PayPal, Luke oversaw the company’s marketing efforts at launch, growing the user base to 1 million customers in the first six months. Luke also created “Instant Transfer,” PayPal’s most profitable product. Prior to PayPal, Luke was an evangelist at Netscape. Luke has also co-founded two other consumer Internet companies, including the Web’s first advertising network, and was an active venture capitalist in his personal capacity before launching Founders Fund. Luke received a BS in Computer Science from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.

Brian Singerman has been a member of the Founders Fund investment team since 2008.

He graduated from Stanford University with a BS in Computer Science, before leaving academia to join a start-up, There, Inc., as a software engineer.  Brian was recruited to Google in March 2004, and spent the next four years as an engineer and executive at Google, where (among other projects) he founded iGoogle.

While at Google, Brian started his career as an investor, founding his own angel fund, the XGYC Fund, seeking early-stage opportunities with businesses that challenge the status quo.  As a Founders Fund partner, Brian relentlessly seeks out companies that can deliver massive returns to investors while also providing real value to humankind.  His investing passions include technologies including healthcare, bio-tech, wearable computing and robotics.

Lauren Gross is Partner & COO at Founders Fund, leading the firm’s non-investment activities, which include running internal operations, overseeing the firm’s legal, finance, branding and administrative teams, working with the partnership on key strategic decisions, leading fundraising, and managing the firm’s limited partner relationships.

Prior to Founders Fund, Lauren spent four years at Clarium Capital Management LLC, a global macro hedge fund. She began her financial career at Citigroup Investment Bank, where she was an analyst in their technology group. Lauren graduated with honors in Economics from Stanford University.

Geoff Lewis is a Partner at Founders Fund. He is focused on backing the founders of transformative companies across a wide range of emerging sectors. Geoff was an early lead investor in the now-mainstream on-demand services, food tech, and mobile commerce sectors. He is also known for leading the first venture capital investment in the legal cannabis space.

Prior to joining Founders Fund in 2012, Geoff was a founder himself. As Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer of Topguest, he created a loyalty software platform that counted United Airlines, Hilton Worldwide, and Standard Hotels as clients. Topguest was then acquired in an eight figure transaction less than two years after Geoff founded the company. Earlier in his career, Geoff served as a Vice President at a global macro hedge fund, a management consultant, and a Brand Manager at Procter & Gamble.

Geoff is a regular expert commentator on entrepreneurship and technology for BLOOMBERG, CNBC, and FOX BUSINESS.  He is also a frequent speaker at events such as SXSW and DISRPUPT.

Born and raised in Canada, Geoff received his Bachelor of Commerce degree with First Class Honors from Queen’s University at Kingston.

Scott Nolan is a Partner at Founders Fund, where he focuses on investments in technology-driven companies across sectors including energy, biotechnology, aerospace, healthcare and advanced manufacturing.  Scott is a board member at CollectiveHealth, Tachyus, Tribogenics and two other companies currently in stealth mode.

Prior to Founders Fund, Scott was an early employee at SpaceX.  There, he helped develop the propulsion systems used on the Falcon 1, Falcon 9 and Dragon vehicles and was responsible for the Dragon capsule’s thermal and environmental control subsystems.

After SpaceX, Scott spent time at Bain & Company working with its private equity clients, and co-founded a startup building social web apps on the Facebook Connect platform.  Scott earned both a BS and MEng in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering from Cornell University in 4 years, and received his MBA from Stanford University where he was co-president of the Entrepreneurs Club.

Napoleon is a Principal at Founders Fund, where he focuses on later-stage investments.

Previously, Napoleon led the equity research division for Horizon Capital Group’s brokerage business in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. In that role, he provided foreign institutional investors with insights on Vietnam’s macro economy, equity markets and listed companies. Napoleon started his career at Credit Suisse First Boston and later transitioned to Citigroup, where he advised technology companies on M&A and capital market transactions. Napoleon graduated with a B.S. in Finance from the University of Colorado and an MBA from Stanford University.

Trae Stephens is a Principal at Founders Fund, where he focuses on startups operating in the government space.

Previously, Trae was an early employee at Palantir Technologies, where he led teams focused on growth in the intelligence/defense space as well as international expansion, helping large organizations solve their hardest data analysis problems. He was also an integral part of the product team, leading the design and strategy for new product offerings. While at Palantir, Trae also served as an adjunct faculty member at Georgetown University.

Prior to Palantir, Trae worked as a computational linguist building enterprise solutions to Arabic/Persian name matching and data enrichment within the United States Intelligence community. He began his career working in the office of then Congressman Rob Portman and in the Political Affairs Office at the Embassy of Afghanistan in Washington, D.C. immediately following the installation of Hamid Karzai’s transitional government. Trae graduated from the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University.

Aaron VanDevender is the Chief Scientist and a Principal at Founders Fund. He monitors the scientific impact of the portfolio, works with portfolio companies, assesses new technologies, and conducts his own research.

Prior to Founders Fund, Aaron was CTO of enterprise war games firm The Prosperity Institute. Aaron has designed single-photon and single-atom quantum computers in academia and government (NIST), advanced the quantum-mechanical theory for microscopic black holes, patented the fastest transparent optical switch, and is a co-inventor of yoctotechnology (named after the smallest unit prefix on the SI scale). He then developed next-generation DNA sequencing technology at Halcyon Molecular. His broad scientific interests encompass energy, biotech, nanotech, and computing. Aaron received a SB from MIT and a PhD in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. In addition to entrepreneurial science, Aaron is a professional skydiver.

Neil Pai is General Counsel at Founders Fund and oversees the legal affairs of the firm, including investment structuring and negotiation, portfolio company management, and fund formation and governance.

Prior to joining Founders Fund, Neil was Vice President and Associate General Counsel at Thiel Capital, where he provided strategic and operational support for Peter Thiel’s investment initiatives and entrepreneurial endeavors. Neil began his legal career at Sidley Austin, an international law firm, where his practice included mergers and acquisitions, securities work, and general corporate governance of public and private companies. Neil received his JD from Harvard Law School and BA degrees in Economics and Sociology from Duke University.

Neil is the Chief Financial Officer at Founders Fund, leading the Finance team, and is responsible for the financial reporting of the firm’s investment funds as well as the day-to-day finance and management company matters.

Prior to joining Founders Fund, Neil was the Controller at VantagePoint Capital Partners, a leading global investor in energy, innovation and efficiency. He was previously the Controller at 3i, a leading international investor focused on private equity, infrastructure and debt management, and prior to that the Accounting Manager at investment banking firm Merriman Curhan Ford. Neil began his career at Ernst & Young LLP where he served as an Audit Manager in the financial services group. He is a registered member of the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants and received his Bachelors degree with honors from the University of Johannesburg in South Africa.

Michael focuses primarily on creative programming and the firm’s network of entrepreneurs, technologists, and professionals. Leading initiatives: Symposium (F50), Anatomy of Next, Shop Talk, and CS-183.

Prior to joining Founders Fund, he edited non-fiction for the Penguin Group (USA). There, he acquired and developed New York Times bestselling work in the fields of technology, politics, philosophy, and humor. He recently published his first novel, Citizen Sim: Cradle of the Stars.

Erin Gleason is Director of Communications at Founders Fund, leading communications and media relations efforts for the firm and serving as a strategic advisor to portfolio companies.

Before joining Founders Fund, Erin was a member of the executive team at The Hatch Agency, a leading technology communications firm based in San Francisco. Prior to that, she was an early employee at Foursquare, where she oversaw the company’s public relations efforts, helping to grow its user base from 1 million to more than 25 million through strategic communications. Erin began her career at Google, working on internal and external communications for the executive engineering team. Erin received a BA in Communications from Stanford University.

Mike is the Creative Director at Founders Fund where he conveys the team’s story through mediums of visual communication.

Over the past three years, Mike has developed and managed several Peter Thiel founded brands including Arda Capital, Clarium Capital Management, Mithril, Presidio One, Thiel Capital, and Valar Ventures. Prior to his move to San Francisco, Mike co-founded a lifestyle dot-com out of New York City which received critical acclaim from trend outlets such as Playboy, FHM, Thrillist, NY Press, and Cool Material. Mike received his Visual Arts degree from the State University of New York at New Paltz.