Ted is now in his third chapter at Madrona, having transitioned from his role as chief product development officer at UiPath in early 2023. Ted brings decades of experience leading high-performing product and engineering teams to the venture partner role, where he focuses on evaluating new investments and advising portfolio companies and their leaders. Ted is passionate about the enterprise and focuses on investments in infrastructure & platforms, data & analytics, and intelligent applications.
Journey to Madrona
Ted first joined Madrona in 2013 as he ended a 23+ year career at Microsoft. He held several roles leading development organizations that built operating systems, consumer online services, enterprise security, enterprise application platforms, and data platforms. In his last role, he was corporate vice president of Microsoft’s Data Platform Group. He led the development of several key Microsoft enterprise products, including SQL Server, SQL Server Parallel Data Warehouse, SQL Azure, and Microsoft’s business intelligence and big data offerings. Prior to Microsoft, Ted worked as an engineer for Apple and Hewlett-Packard.
After his first chapter at Madrona, Ted joined Apptio — a Madrona portfolio company that created the Technology Business Management category. During his four years at Apptio, which included Apptio’s successful IPO in 2016, Ted built a world-class engineering and product team and transformed Apptio’s core platform from a custom solution to distinct SaaS applications, extending Apptio’s market and product portfolio.
After his second chapter at Madrona, Ted joined UiPath in early 2020 as chief product development officer. UiPath is a pioneer and leader in the RPA category and was also a Madrona portfolio company. At UiPath, Ted was responsible for the vision and strategy for UiPath’s automation platform and delivering that for both customer-managed software deployments and via the Automation Cloud, UiPath’s multi-tenant SaaS offering. In addition to his core responsibility of leading products and engineering, Ted was also responsible for IT, security & trust, and product support. During his three-year tenure, which included UiPath’s successful IPO in 2021, he led a major platform expansion that included multiple acquisitions.
Lessons learned
- Software is a people business. If you study the most successful software companies, you will always find they have incredible people and an environment that lets them do their best work.
- Pay attention to your muscles. Many failures to “maximize your opportunity” come when you failed to evolve your processes and capabilities to your new reality – whether that’s the number of products, the size of your team, the size of your code base, the size of your business, or related to a new delivery model.
- Have fun. Software companies are uniquely intense – what other industries so frequently self-disrupt? We do it because we love the intensity, but you also need to pay attention to the long game. Maintain balance in your life, and remember to take a breath and have fun.
When he’s not in the office…
Ted is a rabid soccer and Sounders fan. He loves to run and exercise, which also helps with his love of great food and wine. He and his wife, Pam, raised three boys that are all on their own, but they spend as much time with them as possible.
Noteworthy
Ted is a passionate Husky and graduate of the UW electrical engineering department, where he currently chairs their Industry Advisory Board. Ted also serves on the board of directors of SingleStore.
