Esther Dyson is a Swiss-born American journalist, investor, businesswoman, commentator, and philanthropist, known as a leading angel investor who focused on breakthrough efficacy in healthcare, government transparency, digital technology, biotechnology, and space.
Early life and education
Esther Dyson is a Swiss-born American journalist, investor, businesswoman, commentator, and philanthropist. Dyson was born in Zurich, Switzerland on July 14, 1951. Dyson’s mother, Verena Huber-Dyson is an outstanding mathematician, who is of Swiss parentage, and father, Freeman Dyson is an English-born physicist and futurist writer.
Dyson’s father worked in Princeton, New Jersey at the Institute for Advanced Study, and she grew up habituated to seeing Nobel laureates at their dinner table and started her mini-newspaper at the age of eight. Dyson later worked as a page in the public library.
Dyson attended Harvard University at the age of 16. Dyson graduated with a degree in economics in 1972.
Career
Dyson joined Forbes as a fact-checker after graduating in college; although she had looked forward to becoming an entertainment writer at Variety, and immediately rose to a reporter, where she became captivated by the business world. Dyson joined New Court Securities in 1977, as the research department, following Federal Express and other startups.
Dyson transferred to Rosen Research after a stint at Oppenheimer Holdings covering software companies; and in 1983, she acquired the company from her employer, Ben Rosen, renaming it EDventure Holdings. EDventure Holdings is a pioneering information technology and new media company. Dyson’s career took another turn in 1982 when she joined venture capitalist Ben Rosen and took over Rosen’s Electronic News, an industry newsletter which she bought the following year and renamed Release 1.0.
Dyson’s newsletter rapidly became a must-read amongst elite technology executives. Dyson took over the PC Forum in 1983, an industry hot ticket where Bill Gates rubbed shoulders with Lotus founder Mitch Kapor and other renowned high-tech giants.
Internet Policy Adviser
Dyson turned into an active investor in Eastern European technology ventures in the late 1980s. Dyson also became gradually more involved in the public discussion regarding the future of the Internet. Dyson has assisted arbitrate and advises public policy concerning privacy, encryption, trust, and the project of Internet domain names. Dyson’s Release 2.0, tackled to a wide-ranging, non-technical audience, described in plain English the key issues, and controversies surrounding the evolving Internet.
In 2000 of January, Dyson began writing a syndicated twice-weekly column, Release 3.0 for The New York Times. It deliberates the impact of digital technology on daily life as well as on the world’s financial, social, and political structure. In addition to working EDventure Holdings, Dyson remains to finance in startup Internet companies and to attend on numerous boards that set rule for the Web. Dyson sold EDventure Holdings in 2004 to CNET Networks, but in January 2007, she left CNET.
Investments
Dyson sits on the boards of MEDESK, Eventful.com, Meetup.Inc, 23andME, Luxoft, Pressreader.com (formerly known as NewspaperDirect), Personal Inc, PA Consulting, Voxiva (the company behind text4baby.org in Russia and US), WPP Group, XCOR Aerospace and Yandex (Russia – YNDX).
Dyson was also an early stakeholder in numerous tech startups, amongst them TrutedID, Flickr (sold to Yahoo!), Cygnus Solutions, del.icio.us (sold to Yahoo!), Eventful, Netbeans (sold to Sun Microsystems), Systinet, Powerset, ZEDO, CV-Online, Linkstorm, Medscape (now part of WebMD), Medstory (sold to Microsoft), Valkee, Meetup, Robin Labs and Lexity (sold to Yahoo).
As of early 2007, Dyson refers to herself as “someone who is spending a lot of time on commercial space startups and private aviation” and also in genetics and health care. Dyson has invested in XCOR, Constellation Services (transformed into Nanoracks, www.nanoracks.com), Icon Aircraft, Space Adventures, Zero-G (now part of Space Adventures), and Mars One, and is a member of Space Angels Network. From 2005 – 2007, Dyson held the Flight School conference in Aspen. Dyson is presently in 23andMe as the board of directors and is one of the first ten volunteers in the Personal Genome Project.
Dyson is a prominent angel investor dedicated to revolution efficacy in healthcare, government transparency, biotechnology, digital technology, and space. Dyson is currently aiming her career on health and continues to spend in technology startups and health. Space Adventures declared in October 2008 that Dyson had paid to prepare as a reinforcement spaceflight participant for Charles Simonyi’s journey to the International Space Station aboard the Soyuz TMA-14 mission which took place in 2009. Forbes magazine nominated Dyson as one of the most powerful women in American business is considered as one of the most influential voices in technology.