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Pat Grady

  • Growth
My dad always said ‘when your values are clear, decision-making is easy.’ He was right.

Backstory

My high school jobs were in construction. Compared to making $9 an hour putting down T-Lock shingles in 110-degree heat, studying for midterms was paradise. After college, I went into inside sales—50 dials a day yielded 200 conversations a month. At any point, you could hit a button and see how your metrics ranked. I almost killed myself making sure I was on top every day.

At Sequoia, we get to work for some of the best causes on the planet. That may sound like BS, but it’s something we really care about. The vast majority of the money we invest comes from universities, foundations and other nonprofits. I didn’t know it at the time, but my tuition at Boston College was funded in part by proceeds from Sequoia investments. Our returns make a real impact, which is a privilege and a tremendous responsibility—if we screw up, people lose out on scholarships and cancer research. Now that’s motivation.

On the lookout for

Sequoia partners and the founders we back are the same in one important regard: we have a desperate need to win.

Culture and vision are the two essential roles of a founder. You can hire for any other aspect of a business, but those can’t come from outside. They determine who you are and why you exist. I used to think culture was a fluffy thing people talked about when they didn’t have anything better to say. Boy, was I wrong. Culture is everything. It’s the most scalable system you have.

People at Sequoia have very different backgrounds and views of the world, but we work well together because we all want to help founders make a dent in the universe. We believe in the power of storytelling, and in the stories we tell the founders are the heroes. Every founder deserves a tremendous amount of respect for having the courage and vulnerability to start something—to ignore reason in pursuit of a dream. I’ve never had the guts to do that. Supporting founders on the epic journey of a startup is an honor, and a responsibility we don’t take lightly.

Get in touch with Pat

Personal Side

  • Mountain biking
  • Skiing
  • Road biking
  • Snowboarding
  • Assorted outdoor activities

Press & Media

Companies

Current Companies

Company Name  Short Description Current Stage  Founders First Partnered  collapse
AttentiveAttentive is a personalized text messaging platform for innovative brands.Growth
  • Andrew Jones
  • Brian Long
Growth (2019)Collapse
CriblCribl helps customers easily sift through data to find the nuggets they need.Growth
  • Dritan Bitincka
  • Ledion Bitincka
  • Clint Sharp
Growth (2020)Collapse
GatherGather hosts virtual spaces for work and play. Growth
  • Alex Chen
  • Nate Foss
  • Kumail Jaffer
  • Phillip Wang
Early (2021)Collapse
HarveyHarvey is redefining professional services with generative AI.Early
  • Gabriel Pereyra
  • Winston Weinberg
Early (2023)Collapse
Hugging FaceHugging Face is a community-based repository for open-source ML technology.Growth
  • Julien Chaumond
  • Clément Delangue
  • Thomas Wolf
Growth (2022)Collapse
NeevaNeeva is search reimagined—ad-free, private and deeply personal.Acquired
  • Vivek Raghunathan
  • Sridhar Ramaswamy
Early (2019)Collapse
NotionNotion is a collaborative workspace with notes, docs, wikis, and projects. Growth
  • Simon Last
  • Ivan Zhao
Growth (2021)Collapse
OpenAIOpenAI is an AI research and deployment company dedicated to ensuring that general-purpose artificial intelligence benefits all of humanity. Growth
  • Sam Altman
  • Greg Brockman
  • Ilya Sutskever
Growth (2021)Collapse
PilotPilot provides bookkeeping, tax preparation and CFO services for startups and small businesses.Growth
  • Jeff Arnold
  • Waseem Daher
  • Jessica McKellar
Growth (2020)Collapse

Enduring Companies

Company Name  Short Description Current Stage  Founders First Partnered  collapse
AmplitudeAmplitude is an analytics platform that enables organizations to see and predict which combination of features and actions translate to business outcomes.IPO
  • Curtis Liu
  • Spenser Skates
  • Jeffrey Wang
Growth (2018)Collapse
DriftDrift is a conversational marketing platform that uses chat, email, video and automation.Acquired
  • David Cancel
  • Elias Torres
Growth (2017)Collapse
HubSpotHubSpot builds all-in-one marketing software.IPO
  • Brian Halligan
  • Dharmesh Shah
Early (2011)Collapse
MedalliaMedallia offers customer experience management software.IPO
  • Borge Hald
  • Amy Pressman
Growth (2011)Collapse
MetaswitchMetaswitch, now part of Microsoft, powers voice, data and unified communications services.Acquired
  • Ian Ferguson
Growth (2008)Collapse
OktaOkta is an identity-management service that securely and simply connects people to their applications.IPO
  • Freddy Kerrest
  • Todd McKinnon
Growth (2012)Collapse
OpenDNSOpenDNS, now part of Cisco, is a suite of consumer products aimed at making the internet faster, safer and more reliable.Acquired
  • David Ulevitch
Early (2009)Collapse
QualtricsQualtrics builds operating systemS for experience management.IPO
  • Jared Smith
  • Ryan Smith
Early (2012)Collapse
ServiceNowServiceNow creates digital workflows that unlock productivity.IPO
  • Fred Luddy
Growth (2009)Collapse
SnowflakeSnowflake is a data warehouse platform built for the cloud.IPO
  • Thierry Cruanes
  • Benoit Dageville
  • Marcin Zukowski
Growth (2018)Collapse
Sumo LogicSumo Logic is a cloud-native continuous intelligence platform.IPO
  • Christian Beedgen
Growth (2014)Collapse
SunrunSunrun offers homeowners affordable solar power.IPO
  • Lynn Jurich
Early (2010)Collapse
ZoomZoom brings teams together with cloud-based video communications.IPO
  • Eric Yuan
Growth (2016)Collapse