For more than 35 years, Dixon Doll has influenced and guided entrepreneurs, investors and executives in the computer and communications industries. In recognition of his accomplishments in venture capital, Dixon received the 2013 Special Achievement Award from the International Business Forum. Dixon was also named by Forbes Magazine as one of the top 100 venture investors on its Midas List for four consecutive years. In April, 2005, he was elected to the Board of Directors of the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) in Washington, D.C. He also served as NVCA Chairman from 2008-2009 and as a member of their Executive Committee from 2007-2009. Under Dixon’s leadership and direction as Chairman, the NVCA developed a widely embraced set of recommendations (NVCA 4-Pillar Plan) to help enhance liquidity in the U.S. venture capital industry. These recommendations have resulted in bipartisan Congressional support for new legislation to simplify the IPO process for young emerging growth companies.
Dixon currently serves on the Board of Directors of DIRECTV (DTV), where he also serves on the Compensation and Nominating/Corporate Governance Committees. He is also the Board Chairman of Network Equipment Technologies (NWK) and the past Board Chairman of Force10 Networks, which was recently acquired by Dell. He also serves on the boards of numerous private DCM companies.
Dixon has led DCM’s investments in About.com (Acquired by The New York Times Co.), Adkeeper, @Motion (Acquired by Openwave), CENX, Clearwire (Nasdaq: CLWR), Coradiant (Acquired by BMC), Force10 Networks (Acquired by Dell), Foundry Networks (Nasdaq: FDRY), Internap (Nasdaq: INAP), Ipivot (Acquired by Intel), Neutral Tandem (Nasdaq: TNDM) and Roamware, among others.
In the mid-1980’s, Dixon co-founded the venture capital industry’s first fund focused exclusively on telecommunications opportunities. Those funds launched such noteworthy companies as Alantec, Bridge Communication, Centillion Networks, Network Equipment Technologies, Optilink, Picturetel, Polycom and UUNet.
Earlier, Dixon was the founder and CEO of an internationally recognized strategic consulting firm focused on telecommunications and computer networking. From 1972 to 1980, Dixon also served as a faculty member of the IBM Systems Research Institute in New York City. He authored the seminal text Data Communications published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1978. It was adopted as a course text by more than 60 colleges and universities worldwide.
Dixon has traveled extensively to six continents to serve on advisory boards and give highly sought after lectures and conference presentations. Through their family foundation, he and his wife Carol give generously to numerous educational and philanthropic organizations, including the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco (where he has served as Chair of the museum’s dual governing boards),San Francisco Symphony, Kansas State University, the University of Michigan, the Boys & Girls Clubs of San Francisco, and the University of San Francisco where he has served as the Investment Committee Chair. He has served as a trustee or board member for each of these organizations. He also serves on the Executive Committee and Advisory Board for the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR), is a member of the Board of Overseers at the Hoover Institution at Stanford, and also is a San Francisco City Commissioner.
Dixon received his B.S.E.E. degree (cum laude) from Kansas State University as well as M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering from the University of Michigan, where he was a National Science Foundation scholar.
