Michael Moritz, Partner of the Sequoia Capital, is invited to join the academic council of the Private Equity and Venture Capital (PE&VC) Institute under the China Center for Financial Research (CCFR) on January 17. He delivered a speech named “The Founders’ Code” at Tsinghua SEM, which drew together more than 400 audience.

Michael Moritz

Michael Moritz is a well known venture capitalist. He joined the Sequoia Capital in 1986, and consulted the investment to a number of companies at the initial stage, including Flextronics (1993-2003), Google (1999-2006), PayPal (1999-2001), Yahoo! (1995-2003) and Zappos (2004-2009). He was ranked first on The Forbes Midas List of the top dealmakers in the technology industry in 2006 and 2007, second in 2008 and 2009. He also had a place on the 2007 “TIME 100.”

The event was organized by the PE&VC institute, and moderated by Professor LI Jinliang. CAO Wenlian, Deputy Director of the Department of Fiscal and Financial Affairs of NationalDevelopmentand Reform Commission, presented a welcome note. He and Professor LIAO Li, Associate Dean of Tsinghua SEM, together conferred the appointment letter to Michael Moritz.

CAO Wenlian (left), Professor LIAO Li (right) and Michael Moritz

In the speech, Michael Moritz three key factors for a successful company: products different from what already exist in the market; a passionate founder with strong resolution; and a market with promising potential. He cited the case of Apple to support his arguments.

During the Q&A session, Michael Moritz encouraged young people to set out for entrepreneurship, for people in younger age groups know better about the market and are more sensitive to new trends in making.