Theresia Gouw is co-founder of Aspect Ventures, a leading early stage venture firm with a unique focus on bridging the funding gap between angels and the larger, multistage VC platforms through collaboration and diversity.
Aspect invests across sectors but has particular expertise in cybersecurity, enterprise software and solutions targeting the future of work, and digital health. Gouw has led the firm's early investments in Cato Networks, Deserve, Exabeam, ForeScout, The Muse, Crew, ShieldX and PredictHQ. Prior to Aspect, Gouw was a managing general partner at Accel, where she championed many successful companies through IPOs or acquisitions, including Imperva, Trulia, LearnVest, Jasper Design and Kosmix.
As an entrepreneur, Gouw was founding vice president of business development and sales at Release Software, a venture-backed company that provided SaaS to enable digital rights management and payment technologies for the software industry. Earlier, she worked at Bain & Company and as a product manager at Silicon Graphics.
Gouw serves as treasurer of Brown University's Corporation board, vice chair of Donorschoose.org, is a member of the Global Leadership Circle of ONE.org, the Castilleja School board, and at Stanford she co-teaches a course on Venture Capital at the GSB. She also serves on the GSB Advisory Council and DAPER investment fund.
She is a first-generation immigrant and a passionate supporter of educational causes and increasing diversity in the tech industry. Gouw was named to Forbes' 100 Most Powerful Women list, she has been recognized 7 times on the Forbes Midas List as one of the "world's smartest tech investors" and was named one of the 40 most influential minds in tech by Time magazine.
Gouw holds an ScB in engineering from Brown University, magna cum laude, and an MBA from Stanford University.