9 ms·

The secretive billionaire who built Silicon Valley

175 points by aluciani 12y ago

batbomb 12y ago
Maybe he is secretive, but anybody affiliated with Stanford will instantly recognize his name.
- muzz 12y ago
  And anyone who's passed by any of the construction sites and seen the big "Peery - Arrillaga" banners
crapshoot101 12y ago
Probably not HN's main interest, but Arrillaga is basically the main reason Stanford has sports teams (in particular, funding the football team)- he's basically funded everything they have around that, to say nothing of his other contributions to the school. And amusingly enough, If Silicon Valley has such a thing as a "power couple", Marc Andressen (the new world) and Laura Arillaga (scion of the old world, professor at the GSB) are it.
- FraaJad 12y ago
  could he be the one who gave money anonymously to name Cardinal football team's Offensive coorinator's position as "Andrew Luck Director of Offense"?
  - crapshoot101 12y ago
    I'd be surprised, only because he puts his name on everything else - why make this one anonymous? I assume that the Andrew Luck thing came from some tech donor type, but that's definitely a WAG.
    - jackowayed 12y ago
      He doesn't put his name on everything. Apparently he's contributed to over a hundred buildings and could have had his name on many of the if he wanted to. I heard that he didn't even want his name on the new dining hall, but someone convinced him (which may be why it's "Arillaga Family").
pfraze 12y ago
Is there some kind of private-sector/public-sector "who built silicon valley" battle going on right now? See [1] 1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8001224 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8001224 EDIT: may just be coincidence, but they're pretty close together.
- Patient0 12y ago
  I agree it's striking that these two articles came out at the same time. Two PR firms waging battle against each other in advance of some sort of political decision?
  - eli 12y ago
    Which political decision? Coincidence seems more likely.
- SolarNet 12y ago
  They are both true too. The government's involvement with the early history of silicon valley prompted the need for more buildings, which these guys supplied. I mean they were smart, they saw a demand and filled it, and then they got lucky when silicon valley became massively successful. I think the more interesting thing is that they are using slightly different connotations of the word built. The government "built" silicon valley as a conceptual place. And these guys literally built it.
sscalia 12y ago
This really isn't newsworthy. Also, anyone even marginally working in the Real Estate industry is a scumbag. This man added no value other than as an intermediary; he may have added value to Stanford (questionable) but he got rich off land. Nothing more.
antidaily 12y ago
tl;dr it's Oprah.
Lannister1980 12y ago
Right. Anyone who's gone to Stanford will know the name. Cool to read the backstory, though.
- ZanyProgrammer 12y ago
  I assume you're assuming most people here went to Stanford. Not too surprising.
  - philbarr 12y ago
    I didn't go to Stanford. What's Stanford?
    - kghose 12y ago
      It's a small junk shop run by a man and his son .. oh, you said S_T_anford.
  - jessriedel 12y ago
    Be nice. The point is that it's silly to call someone "secretive" when they are well known by 50k alumni of the most influential school in the region under discussion.
danelectro 12y ago
In the article Fortune refers to Hewlett & Packard as "computer whizzes". Negatory. They were electronic (vacuum tube) whizzes who staked their entrepreneurialism to advanced instrumentation. Then world war broke out again and government contracts were very good to them. Later, solid-state electronics came along, and eventually computers and these were adopted early by HP simply because they were . . . well . . . electronic, and HP was a (non-consumer) electronic leader by then. Computers were definitely not their main thing when the company was still in possession of its true greatness.
redwood 12y ago
So... who is Company X?
willphippshuman 12y ago
the cia have a file on him.
pyfish 12y ago
"Their speculative approach was essentially unheard-of locally, but the two believed that if they built the office space, tenants would come." That's awesome; "built it and they will come" - an approach I have recently overcome the fear of, due to them never coming on a couple projects I learned from. I appreciate how they disliked borrowing in the early stages, too.
- saraid216 12y ago
  "Build it and they will come" works a lot better with land, since land is pretty finite and people tend to want to do something with it. Also see the adage, "location location location". Online mindshare, on the other hand, is basically infinite and unless there's a path to discovery, there's not really any reason for people to show up.

175 points by aluciani 12y ago

batbomb 12y ago

Maybe he is secretive, but anybody affiliated with Stanford will instantly recognize his name.

muzz 12y ago
And anyone who's passed by any of the construction sites and seen the big "Peery - Arrillaga" banners

crapshoot101 12y ago

Probably not HN's main interest, but Arrillaga is basically the main reason Stanford has sports teams (in particular, funding the football team)- he's basically funded everything they have around that, to say nothing of his other contributions to the school. And amusingly enough, If Silicon Valley has such a thing as a "power couple", Marc Andressen (the new world) and Laura Arillaga (scion of the old world, professor at the GSB) are it.

FraaJad 12y ago
could he be the one who gave money anonymously to name Cardinal football team's Offensive coorinator's position as "Andrew Luck Director of Offense"?
- crapshoot101 12y ago
  I'd be surprised, only because he puts his name on everything else - why make this one anonymous? I assume that the Andrew Luck thing came from some tech donor type, but that's definitely a WAG.
  - jackowayed 12y ago
    He doesn't put his name on everything. Apparently he's contributed to over a hundred buildings and could have had his name on many of the if he wanted to. I heard that he didn't even want his name on the new dining hall, but someone convinced him (which may be why it's "Arillaga Family").

pfraze 12y ago

Is there some kind of private-sector/public-sector "who built silicon valley" battle going on right now? See [1] 1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8001224 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8001224 EDIT: may just be coincidence, but they're pretty close together.

Patient0 12y ago
I agree it's striking that these two articles came out at the same time. Two PR firms waging battle against each other in advance of some sort of political decision?
- eli 12y ago
  Which political decision? Coincidence seems more likely.
SolarNet 12y ago
They are both true too. The government's involvement with the early history of silicon valley prompted the need for more buildings, which these guys supplied. I mean they were smart, they saw a demand and filled it, and then they got lucky when silicon valley became massively successful. I think the more interesting thing is that they are using slightly different connotations of the word built. The government "built" silicon valley as a conceptual place. And these guys literally built it.

sscalia 12y ago

This really isn't newsworthy. Also, anyone even marginally working in the Real Estate industry is a scumbag. This man added no value other than as an intermediary; he may have added value to Stanford (questionable) but he got rich off land. Nothing more.

antidaily 12y ago

tl;dr it's Oprah.

Lannister1980 12y ago

Right. Anyone who's gone to Stanford will know the name. Cool to read the backstory, though.

ZanyProgrammer 12y ago
I assume you're assuming most people here went to Stanford. Not too surprising.
- philbarr 12y ago
  I didn't go to Stanford. What's Stanford?
  - kghose 12y ago
    It's a small junk shop run by a man and his son .. oh, you said S_T_anford.
- jessriedel 12y ago
  Be nice. The point is that it's silly to call someone "secretive" when they are well known by 50k alumni of the most influential school in the region under discussion.

danelectro 12y ago

In the article Fortune refers to Hewlett & Packard as "computer whizzes". Negatory. They were electronic (vacuum tube) whizzes who staked their entrepreneurialism to advanced instrumentation. Then world war broke out again and government contracts were very good to them. Later, solid-state electronics came along, and eventually computers and these were adopted early by HP simply because they were . . . well . . . electronic, and HP was a (non-consumer) electronic leader by then. Computers were definitely not their main thing when the company was still in possession of its true greatness.

redwood 12y ago

So... who is Company X?

willphippshuman 12y ago

the cia have a file on him.

pyfish 12y ago

"Their speculative approach was essentially unheard-of locally, but the two believed that if they built the office space, tenants would come." That's awesome; "built it and they will come" - an approach I have recently overcome the fear of, due to them never coming on a couple projects I learned from. I appreciate how they disliked borrowing in the early stages, too.

saraid216 12y ago
"Build it and they will come" works a lot better with land, since land is pretty finite and people tend to want to do something with it. Also see the adage, "location location location". Online mindshare, on the other hand, is basically infinite and unless there's a path to discovery, there's not really any reason for people to show up.