What Happened?

About the Company

At Microsoft, our mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. Our mission is grounded in both the world in which we live and the future we strive to create. Today, we live in a mobile-first, cloud-first world, and the transformation we are driving across our businesses is designed to enable Microsoft and our customers to thrive in this world. We do business in 170 countries and are made up of 144,000 passionate employees dedicated to fulfilling our mission of helping you and your organization achieve more.

About the Person

Nathan Myhrvold founded Intellectual Ventures in 2000 after retiring from his position as chief strategist and chief technology officer of Microsoft Corporation. At Intellectual Ventures, Myhrvold is focused on a variety of business interests relating to the funding, creation and commercialization of inventions. During his 14-year tenure at Microsoft, Dr. Myhrvold held various positions within the company and was responsible for founding Microsoft Research and numerous technology groups that resulted in many of Microsoft's most successful products. He has extensive experience successfully linking research to product development and commercialization. In 1986, Myhrvold’s company Dynamical Systems was acquired by Microsoft.  Prior to that, he was a postdoctoral fellow in the department of applied mathematics and theoretical physics at Cambridge University and worked with Professor Stephen Hawking on research in cosmology, quantum field theory in curved space time and quantum theories of gravitation.  Dr. Myhrvold holds hundreds of patents and has hundreds issued or pending. Dr. 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 Dr. Myhrvold the James Madison Medal, the university’s top honor for alumni. He also has a master's degree in geophysics and space physics and a bachelor's degree in mathematics, both from UCLA.  Currently, he serves on the Advisory Board for the Department of Physics at the University of Washington.  He is also an affiliate research associate of paleontology at the Museum of the Rockies where he funds and participates in paleontological research and yearly expeditions. Dr. Myhrvold is a member of the 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. An avid nature and wildlife photographer, Dr. Myhrvold’s work is featured in the books “America 24/7” and “Washington 24/7” where his photographs helped capture a week in the life of people and nature in the United States during the spring of 2003. His research has been published in scientific journals including Science, Nature, Paleobiology, Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology and the Physical Review and he has contributed articles to magazines including Harvard Business Review, The Wall Street Journal, Fortune, Time, and National Geographic Traveler. In 2004, he provided the foreword to a book profiling some of the world’s greatest inventors – “Juice: The Creative Fuel that Drives World-Class Inventors.” He has also been named one of the most influential people in IP by several leading IP trade publications. His other accomplishments include founding The Cooking Lab and hiring an interdisciplinary team that includes scientists, research chefs, and writers, and publishing the much-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). The Cooking Lab partnered with Inkling to publish the Modernist Cuisine at Home app.