Nathan Myhrvold

Founder & Chief Executive Officer

Dr. Nathan Myhrvold founded Intellectual Ventures (IV) in 2000 after retiring from his position as chief strategist and chief technology officer of Microsoft Corporation. During his 14-year tenure at Microsoft, Myhrvold helped spearhead many of the company’s most successful products and founded Microsoft Research.

Today, Myhrvold is focused on building a market for invention, where inventors realize the value of their ideas.  Under his leadership, IV manages one of the largest and fastest growing intellectual property (IP) portfolios in the world, with more than 40,000 assets and over $6 billion in total committed capital. IV’s investors include many of the world’s most innovative companies and renowned academic and research institutions.

Myhrvold earned a postdoctoral fellow from the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics at Cambridge University while working with Professor Stephen Hawking on research in cosmology, quantum field theory in “curved spacetime” and quantum theories of gravitation. Prior to Cambridge, Myhrvold earned a doctorate in theoretical and mathematical physics and a master’s degree in mathematical economics from Princeton University. In 2005, in recognition of his distinguished career, Princeton awarded Myhrvold the James Madison Medal, the University’s highest honor for alumni. He also holds a master’s degree in geophysics and space physics and a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from the University of California at Los Angeles. Myhrvold is also an avid inventor himself and holds hundreds of issued patents.

Myhrvold is an accomplished author having co-authored and published the acclaimed five-volume 2,438-page cookbook Modernist Cuisine: The Art and Science of Cooking (2011), Modernist Cuisine at Home (2012), and The Photography of Modernist Cuisine (2013). Many of his academic essays are published in leading scientific journals including Science, Nature, Paleobiology, Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology and Physical Review. He has also authored numerous essays on the tech industry, bio-terrorism, and climate change forHarvard Business Review, The Wall Street Journal, Fortune, Time, and National Geographic Traveler among others.

Currently, Myhrvold serves as an affiliate research associate of paleontology at both the Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture in Seattle, and at The Museum of the Rockies in Bozeman, Montana where he funds and participates in paleontological research and yearly expeditions. Myhrvold is a member of United Way’s Million Dollar Roundtable and a regular contributor to local Seattle arts and education non-profits. In 2000, he partnered with Paul Allen and pledged $1 million to the SETI Foundation to fund the development phase of the world’s most powerful telescope – the Allen Telescope Array.