When John Doerr started his 1996 political crusade against California's Proposition 211, the venture capitalist knew he was leading Silicon Valley onto an unfamiliar battleground: politics.
But Proposition 211 was the perfect spur to move the generally apolitical moneymakers of the West Coast high-tech industry into the political fray. The initiative that would have lowered barriers to class-action lawsuits charging stock fraud and opened individual corporate directors and officers to personal liability hit high-tech execs where it hurt most - in the pocketbooks.
Whether Doerr, a senior partner in Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, could parlay the coalition that beat back the measure into a lasting political force, however, has been open to question.
Not anymore. On Tuesday, Doerr and Netscape CEO Jim Barksdale plan to announce the formation of Technology Network, a California-based organization geared to push political causes dear to the industry's heart and give Silicon Valley leaders an organized voice.
Co-chaired by Doerr and Barksdale, TechNet has the backing of Cisco Systems' John Chambers, Intuit's Scott Cook, National Semiconductor's Brian Halla, Sun Microsystems' Scott McNealy, CNET's Halsey Minor, Marimba's Kim Polese, Robertson Stephens' Sandy Robertson, and former Hewlett-Packard CEO John Young.
