Because I managed four venture capital firms, and have been a member of 30 boards of directors I have reviewed thousands of business plans, financed scores of companies and worked through the many hard problems that needed to be solved to keep companies on the success path.
My work now has these goals:
- Help US companies grow and thrive in a world of increasing competition.
- Help smooth the success path for emerging companies.
- Help develop Tennessee into an innovation haven comparable with that in Silicon Valley.
Curriculum Vitae
I love helping company owners get rich. My contribution to that goal is coaching them on the way to an exit and executing the exit process so as to maximize their return. I have developed the needed skills to help company owners and CEOs over several decades as a C-suite operator and financier of dozens of companies. I managed four venture capital firms (founded two of them) with combined capital under management exceeding $500 million. I successfully managed nine companies through periods of disruption in their growth. I have been a highly influential director of nearly 30 for-profit (private and public) and non-profit organizations. My efforts have helped create billions of dollars in market value and thousands of jobs.
Art Agnos-- Senior Advisor
Art Agnos has lived in San Francisco for 47 years where he began work as a civil rights social worker in city public housing and gradually became politically active as a California State Assemblyman, Mayor of San Francisco, and an appointee of President Clinton in the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
As mayor of San Francisco, he received national attention for his work in directing the city’s response to the 1989 “Loma Prieta” earthquake. As a result, he has been invited to provide seminars on disaster response, governance and community participation in various countries around the world including South Africa, Angola, Sierra Leone, Palestine, Turkey, Russia, Korea and China.
Some unique highlights in a very fulfilling life include surviving being shot while volunteering in a public housing project in what came to be known as the Zebra killings, hosting Soviet Union President Mikhail Gorbachev during his first visit to the US after the end of the Cold War, and befriending Mother Theresa who came to his house to ask for help with her homeless facilities. Art has been on several boards of directors including Linear Technology Corporation and Global Food Technologies.
Art and his wife Sherry have two sons who are working in the field of Sustainability and Communications. They continue to live in San Francisco where they both remain active in private and public sector educational and community affairs.
If you have any of the following needs at the federal, state or local government levels you should contact us about coaching you to a successful outcome.
- You need an approval or mandatory guidance and are getting nowhere.
- You have one or more important regulatory questions you are not getting answers to.
- You need adroit, expert guidance on how to successfully approach and solve bureaucratic, regulatory, and political matters affecting your products or services.
- You are experiencing what you consider to be unneeded involvement in some aspect of your business and you need help in navigating the bureaucracy to get a fair resolution to your problem.