“When you start a business, it can seem like the whole world is conspiring to make you fail,” notes Tom Volpe. “That’s one reason I have so much respect for those who are willing to take the leap.” An investor in science and technology companies, Volpe says he decided to endow an entrepreneurship fund at HBS “to add fuel to the fire that kindles the entrepreneurial spirit.”

In a career that has included leadership roles at firms such as Blyth Eastman Paine Webber, Hambrecht & Quist, and Volpe Brown Whelan & Company—as well as his own firm, Volpe Investments LLC—Volpe has been involved in the early stages of numerous successful start-ups, including Genentech’s dramatic public launch in 1980.

Currently, Volpe continues to invest in entrepreneurial ventures, serves on numerous boards, and travels frequently to the Middle East on business for the Dubai Group, a diversified global financial services company where he served as CEO from 2007 to 2010. A lifelong baseball fan, he owns three minor-league baseball teams and often attends San Francisco Giants games with his close friend and Bay Area neighbor Arthur Rock (MBA 1951).

“Arthur’s gift to establish the Arthur Rock Center for Entrepreneurship at HBS helped put a stake in the ground that said entrepreneurship is an important part of graduate business education,” Volpe states. “I’m thrilled to contribute to that movement.”

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