Shernaz Daver

Operating Partner & CMO at Khosla Ventures

Shernaz is an Operating Partner and CMO at Khosla Ventures, with a track record of building brands and scaling operational teams across a range of businesses from frontier technology and life sciences to consumer and enterprise companies.

Previously, Shernaz served as executive advisor to GV (Google Ventures), and was instrumental in building the fund. More recently she advised one of the fastest-growing life sciences companies, 10x Genomics, through its 2019 IPO — one of the top five performing IPOs that year.

Shernaz has worked with a wide range of global companies including Netflix, Walmart, Motorola, Baidu, Khan Academy, Zynga, Electronic Arts, Groupon, Kosmix, Savvis (CenturyLink), Polyvore (Yahoo), Voyage (Cruise), Kitty Hawk and Guardant Health, among others. She introduced Chinese company Baidu to the U.S. market prior to its public offering, helped Netflix win the war against Blockbuster, and built a technology brand position for Walmart through the creation of its @WalmartLabs division.

She was also CMO of Udacity, where she grew its user base, revenues, partnerships and brand through numerous channels. Earlier, for the first-generation search engine Inktomi, she was CMO and head of investor relations who guided its IPO. Under her leadership, Inktomi became one of the hottest Internet brands, reaching a valuation of $37 billion. She has also worked in the videogame industry across several companies after beginning her career at Sun Microsystems in both the U.S. and Europe.

Shernaz gives talks in the US and internationally on topics such as entrepreneurship, company-building and developing long-lasting brands. She has been featured in business books, addressed members of the U.S. Congress on the future of work, and spoken at the Milken Institute, Fortune Brainstorm Tech and Startup Grind, among others.

She completed her undergraduate degree in communications at Stanford University (Phi Beta Kappa) and her M.A. in Interactive Technologies at Harvard University.

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Timeline

  • Operating Partner & CMO

    Current role

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