Almost 40 years ago, In 1979, Bob Metcalfe called up his MIT Sigma Nu fraternity brother Howard Charney, a motorcycle aficionado, and asked for his help to incorporate 3Com for $300. Howard joined as company counsel, and moved into a wide variety of roles - VP Engineering, Manufacturing, etc.
Later when 3Com's VCs desired more adult supervision, Wally Davis of Mayfield Fund introduced Bob to Bill Krause, who interviewed with Bob at Mac's Tea Room (RIP, it was closed in 2000 after 62 years, having started in 1938) in Los Altos in January of 1981. Bill started in March as employee number 12. Both Bob and Bill were highly ranked tennis players and found their Sunday matches productive!
"Where are we on this journey? We're on this inexorable journey where the network is going to insinuate itself into your life unbelievably. It's going to change the behavior, everything's going to become cloud-based.... It's continuous. It's a continuous journey and we are going to have to build it out." - Howard Charney, in an interview in Silicon Valley Business Journal, March 2014.
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