The TechFellow Awards is different. Rather than just recognizing outstanding innovators, each of its 20 winners receives $100,000 to invest in startups of their choice. Its purpose? To fund the next generation of high-tech entrepreneurship.
Today, Founders Fund, TechCrunch, and New Enterprise Associates (NEA) announce the opening of nominations for the third annual TechFellows Awards. From now until February 17th, visit the new TechFellows website and click “Nominate a TechFellow”. There you can submit the name of a born leader, disruptive visionary, product genius, or engineering wizard who deserves a greater chance to shape the future.
This year’s 2011 TechFellow Awards selection committee includes Peter Thiel, Ron Conway, Mark Zuckerberg, Sean Parker, Michael Arrington, and more tech industry moguls (full list below). They’ll vet the submissions and select 5 winners from each of the four categories: Engineering Leadership, Product Design and Marketing, General Management, and Disruptive Innovation.
On February 22nd the winners will be announced at an awards ceremony at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Each winner will allocate the $100,000 as they see fit, whether that means funding an idea that could change the world or supporting a business plan they’re sure could be successful. Thanks to the structure of the TechFellow funds, each winner gets to share in the success of all 2011 TechFellow companies.
TechFellows winners have gone on to found Quora and Flipboard, while Trigger.io, Mixel, Captricity, and Woven Systems have all been beneficiaries of TechFellow investments. 2010 TechFellow winners included Jack Dorsey, Dave Morin, Paul Graham, and Aaron Sittig, while the 2009 class featured Michael Birch and Adam D’Angelo.
So go nominate your picks for the 2011 TechFellow Awards, and check back here for coverage of the awards ceremony and the companies that receive funding.
Here’s the updated, full list of confirmed 2011 TechFellow Awards selection committee members
- Marc Andreessen (Co-Founder, Andreeseen Horowitz, Netscape)
- Michael Arrington (Founder, TechCrunch)
- John Battelle (Founder/Chairman/CEO, Federated Media)
- Ron Conway (Managing Partner, SV Angel)
- Chris DeWolfe (Co-Founder, Myspace)
- Esther Dyson (Chairman, EDventure)
- Caterina Fake (Co-Founder, Flickr, Hunch)
- Shawn Fanning (Founder, Napster, SNOCAP, Rupture, Airtime)
- Reid Hoffman (Co-Founder, LinkedIn)
- Joi Ito (Director, MIT Media Lab; Chairman of the board, Creative Commons)
- Max Levchin (Founder/CEO, Slide; Co-Founder, PayPal)
- Marisa Mayer (VP Location & Local Services, Google)
- Dave McClure (Founder, 500 Startups & Partner, Founders Fund)
- John McKinley (Founder/CEO, OurParents)
- Jonathan Miller (CEO Digital Media, News Corp)
- Tim O’Reilly (Founder, O’Reilly Media)
- Sean Parker (Co-Founder, Napster, Plaxo, Causes, Airtime; Founding President, Facebook; Managing Partner, Founders Fund)
- Geoff Ralston (Former Chief Product Officer, Yahoo!; Former CEO, Lala)
- Terry Semel (Chairman/CEO, Windsor Media; Former Chairman/CEO, Yahoo!)
- Danny Sullivan (Founder, Search Engine Land)
- Peter Thiel (Managing Partner, Founders Fund; Chairman & Co-Founder, Palantir Technologies; Former Chairman, CEO and Co-Founder, PayPal)
- Jeff Weiner (CEO, LinkedIn)
- Michael Yanover (Business Development, Creative Artists Agency)
- Mark Zuckerberg (Founder/CEO, Facebook)