Venture For America
Post date: Apr 5, 2015 3:29:24 AM
VFA IS HEADING TO LAS VEGAS
Posted on March 27, 2012 by Andrew Yang
We wrote back in January about our visit to Las Vegas to meet with Tony Hsieh of Zappos, his partner Fred Mossler, Zach Ware, Don Welch and the rest of the Downtown Project team. Well, its now official that Venture for America will be sending a number of Venture Fellows in August of this year to support their efforts to rebuild downtown Las Vegas.
What Tony and his team are undertaking right now in Las Vegas is one of the most impressive and fascinating initiatives in the country. Can one revitalize and invigorate an entire metro area through resources and passion? In this era of struggling communities and fitful job creation, can a small group of people create a movement to turn a place around? In many respects, its a logical extension of the Delivering Happiness idea of a company as a community. After Zappos moves into its new headquarters in the old City Hall in downtown Las Vegas, Tony and company are going to be building the community around them. Theyre armed with a massive war chest thanks to Tonys personal commitment and the success of Zappos, which itself demonstrates what this team is capable of.
When I was at SXSW on a panel earlier this month, I was asked by a Las Vegas resident what can be done to build a thriving start-up ecosystem in the region. I responded, Well, were about to find out if it can be done, because Tony Hsieh’s about to take it on in the most significant way one could imagine.
If you take a step back and look at Tonys track record, its staggering. After college, he started and sold a company to Microsoft for $265 million. He then became a venture investor and CEO of Zappos, a company that touches millions of peoples lives and was acquired by Amazon for over $1 billion. He wrote a best-selling book that has impacted companies and people everywhere. Now he and his team are looking to turn around downtown Las Vegas, in one of the hardest hit cities in the country (the citys unemployment rate currently stands at 12.7%). The bar keeps getting higher and higher.
Tony, Fred, Zach, Don, Connie, and the rest of the Downtown Project team embody the principles that Venture for America is looking to restore to our culture of achievement: value creation, risk and reward, and the common good. Theyre an outstanding group of people, and were privileged to be sending some of our countrys best and brightest to support their work.