UPDATE 1-Sequoia's Michael Moritz to leave Google board
PALO ALTO, Calif., Mar 22 (Reuters) - Michael Moritz, the Silicon Valley venture capitalist who was an early investor and long-running board member at Google Inc. (GOOG.O) plans to resign as a director, the company said on Thursday.
The Mountain View, California-based company said Moritz, a Google director since May 1999, will not seek reelection to its board of directors at the 2007 stockholder meeting scheduled for May 10.
Moritz, ranked No. 1 technology dealmaker on Forbes magazine's Midas List this year, wants to focus more time on his responsibilities as a general partner of Sequoia Capital, the company said. He joined Sequoia Capital in 1986.
Sequoia was one of the two original venture capital firms to invest in Google in 1999. Its stake became worth billions of dollars after the company's 2004 initial public offering.
The investment in Google catapulted Sequoia into the top ranks of Silicon Valley venture capital firms. Sequoia was also the sole venture capital firm to invest in YouTube before Google acquired it for $1.65 billion late last year.
Other early investments by Sequoia have included PayPal, now a unit of eBay Inc. (EBAY.O), eBay itself, Yahoo Inc. (YHOO.O), Cisco Systems Inc. (CSCO.O) and Apple Inc. (AAPL.O).
Born in Wales and educated at Oxford and the Wharton School of Business, Moritz, a former journalist for Time magazine, was Sequoia's lead investor in Yahoo, PayPal and Google.
He sat on the board of directors of Yahoo, now a rival of Google, from 1995 until 2003. His track record is not only one of unbroken success: He also backed dot-com failures such as Webvan and eToys.
