Sharon (K.) Gillenwater

Sharon’s non-traditional background as a San Francisco-based tech entrepreneur and founder is unique. Her parents were not college graduates or business people, and she did not come from generational wealth. She grew up in a working class family in Southern California - her father worked in the plating shop for PSA Airlines and her mother was a computer programmer for the U.S. Navy. Sharon became the first person in her family to earn a college degree, attending the University of California at San Diego (UCSD) and earning a Bachelor’s in Communications. She went on to earn a Master’s degree from UCSD’s School of Global Policy and Strategy, and moved to San Francisco shortly after receiving her degree. Sharon discovered her love of business at age 30, and integrated herself into the tech and marketing world in San Francisco. Her first job in San Francisco was working in sales at a startup offering language localization services, and she went on to found a company specializing in email newsletters ahead of the 2001 dot com bust. Eventually, Sharon became an independent consultant and developed a successful business working for major tech companies including EMC, IBM, VMware, RSA, Symantec, Cisco, Microsoft, NetApp, VMware, Adobe, Oracle, Sun Microsystems, Siebel Systems, and Google.