DFJ Mercury Venture Partners, LP managing directors Dan Watkins and Blair Garrou will speak as a part of the IES Entrepreneurship Lecture series at 11 a.m. Tuesday, Oct. 2 in the Landes Auditorium of the Galloway Business Building.
All members of the community are invited to hear Watkins and Garrou’s perspective on the venture capitalism industry, the emerging markets in software and life sciences in Texas, and the growing entrepreneurial climate in the Greater Houston area.
In addition to serving as a managing director for DFJ Mercury, Dan Watkins founded and was a managing partner of A3 Associates, LP, a Houston-based firm focused on seed-stage investments and advisory services for start-up companies. It was in this role that Watkins served as president and founding investor of Advanced Reality, a startup firm that develops software to make existing and new applications collaborative. He is the founder of Nanospectra Biosciences, a company that is developing a medical device that destroys solid tumors.
He served as the CEO of DNAtrix, a firm that is developing DNA sequencing and modification technology. He is a co-founder of the Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship. Watkins earned a B.S. in material science and engineering from Rice University and his M.S. and Ph.D. in material science and engineering from Carnegie Mellon University. Watkins has been awarded three National Science Foundation grants as principal investigator for research in nanotechnology and life sciences.
Blair Garrou has an array of experience in the technology industry. In addition to serving as a managing director of DFJ Mercury, Garrou teaches venture capitalism as an adjunct professor of management at the Jones Graduate School of Business at Rice University. In past positions, he served as the CEO of Intermat, Inc. and led the sale of the company, the world’s leading provider of parts optimization software tools and services at the time, to Information Handling Services, Inc. Furthermore, Blair was a principal of Genesis Park, LP, a firm focused on buyouts, partnering strategies with public corporations, and growth financing.
He served as the director of operations for the Houston Technology Center. The center has helped companies raise more than $500 million for technological growth, and it houses the Gulf Coast Regional Center of Innovation and Commercialization. During his tenure there, Garrou led the formation of the Houston Angel Network, Houston’s first angel investment organization. Garrou is a licensed CPA in Texas. He received a bachelor’s degree in management with special attainments in commerce from Washington and Lee University.
Every year the Institute for Entrepreneurial Studies organizes a lecture series that adheres to the institution’s mission statement, “to stimulate economic development and diversification in Southeast Texas by addressing the needs of current entrepreneurs and small businesses, while simultaneously enhancing the education of tomorrow's entrepreneurs.”
Russ Waddill, entrepreneur-in-residence of the College for Business and organizer of the lecture series, chose the two men because of their significant experience in the technology industry. As managing directors of the Texas-based venture capital fund, Watkins and Garrou oversee investments in companies that are addressing large market opportunities in information technology, applied materials and life science.
