Everdream…

…that you’d ring the NASDAQ opening bell?

Congrats to the Rive brothers today (for the SolarCity IPO).

I first met them in April 1999, and invested in their first company Everdream. At the time, the brothers sold IT services door to door by skateboard in Santa Cruz. The photos here and below are from the January 2000 profile in Business 2.0 (which I can’t find online). Lyndon, Peter and Russell Rive built a great business solving the IT headaches of small businesses, while playing indoor ultimate Frisbee in the open bays at their Fremont HQ. Eventually the company was sold to Dell, providing the capital that their cousin Elon needed to save Tesla in darkest December of the financial crisis of 2008.

Tonight, please lift a glass to the Rive brothers and the American dream.

7 responses to “Everdream…”

jurvetson

Dec 14, 2012 at 5:33 am

more photos…

I found a profile interview in the news:

The idea for SolarCity came to Lyndon Rive on a trip with cousin Elon Musk to Burning Man in 2004.

"That’s when the light bulb went off," Rive said.

A decade later, SolarCity is among the largest solar companies in the country, with operations in 19 states, 15,000 employees and 300,000 customers.

In ’99, we got our first funding from DFJ. Steve Jurvetson led that round. At 20 years old, I got my first $2 million check. I went, "Wow. OK."

Q: Is there competition between you, your brothers, your cousins?

A: Business competition? No. There is no competition. Elon trumps all.

=)

Reply
scleroplex

Dec 14, 2012 at 6:28 am

cheers!

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RRNeal

Dec 14, 2012 at 11:58 am

Excellent!

Reply
js.brain

Dec 14, 2012 at 11:46 pm

Great story and since 1999, wow!

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ukweli

Dec 17, 2012 at 2:15 pm

Awesome.

Reply
jurvetson

Nov 7, 2013 at 7:04 pm

And now, they have a DFJ Golden Frisbee…. In the early days of everdream, they played indoor ultimate in an empty bay… ceiling bounces were a great trick move

Reply
jurvetson

May 16, 2017 at 7:17 pm

On to the next adventure: http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/lyndon-rive-is-leavi...

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Everdream…

7 responses to “Everdream…”

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