Aileen Lee

“Many entrepreneurs, and the venture investors who back them, seek to build billion-dollar companies.”

“The question for Dropbox is whether, when they run out of private sources for funding, they will be able to maintain that valuation when they go to public sources for funding and their valuation is set on the public markets.”

“There's an opportunity to make your board - and your company - smarter by adding diversity, especially of gender.”

“I did not grow up thinking that I wanted to be an engineer. I had read some articles about girls becoming increasingly scientifically illiterate and that girls lacked confidence in their capabilities when it came to quantitative skills. And I just thought that was kind of wrong.”

“Starting a company and being a founder is really hard, and most companies fail. You really have to have a deep commitment and belief in it and be willing to see it through many ups and downs.”

“I think it's embarrassing for our industry that we have such low diversity across senior-level management at all of the mainstream, top-tier venture capital firms.”

“The world is diverse, and having a professional team that mirrors the world is going to be more helpful for us.”

“Why do investors seem to care about 'billion dollar exits?' Historically, top venture funds have driven returns from their ownership in just a few companies in a given fund of many companies.”

“I've learned that you really cannot judge a book by its cover.”

“Over the long term, there will be many more billion-dollar technology companies than there are today.”

“Women are going to be a huge force in developing Web and mobile companies.”

“The reality is that in a tech environment that is 90 percent to 100 percent male, it's not super-encouraging for females to be successful. It's just a lot of things that contribute to that: things that people do or things that people say that they may not realize have unintended consequences.”

“I'm a huge believer in power of women on the web.”

“I think, from a woman's perspective, that my interest as an investor and the way that I relate to entrepreneurs is a little bit different.”

“It's awesome that you have a female CFO and a female GC, but if you look at the investing partners, and it's 15 dudes, I do think those people are going to get left behind if they don't get with where the world is going.”

“I appreciate the sacrifices my dad made. I went to a great public high school.”

“Top creative and innovative talent wants to live in a vibrant, transit-friendly, global city that offers access to not only great jobs but also great food, entertainment and culture.”

“Savvy companies are quietly changing up their boards of directors and teams, and this is giving them better collective intelligence, more community admiration, and better financial results.”

“It's not that I am saying that women and men are completely different. But I do think that if you are one of the only people around the table who is a woman, by definition, you're different.”

“There is very little diversity among founders in the Unicorn Club.”