Member News

June 07, 2013

When did your interest in music begin?

I grew up in Nacka, Sweden, considered the most musical city in the country. A big part of the school curriculum revolved around music. So when I was in first grade, I was tested to see if I could tell the difference between two notes and so on. The next thing I knew I was playing the violin. My parents were shaking their heads and covering their ears, but later they started to like it.

So how did you transition your career from classical violin to software?

When I was in Sweden, I was also studying science and engineering. But I wanted to come to the U.S. to study with Ivan Galamian. I sent him a tape hoping he would give me one lesson, and I got a letter back saying that I had been accepted as a student. So I quit my job in Sweden the next day and bought a ticket to New York. I also got a day job at Arthur Young & Co., which later became Ernst & Young, doing computer consulting.

When you’re not working, where can we find you?

I do a lot of stuff with my kids. We play sports, and making dinner together is a big part of our life.

What was the last vacation you took?

We went on a Baltic cruise from Stockholm to St. Petersburg and back, stopping in Latvia and Helsinki. We went to the snazziest McDonald’s I’ve ever seen. It looked like an art gallery.

Fantasy dinner party guests, alive or dead?

I would invite Mozart. Music is very mathematical. I’d also like to dine with the scientists Richard Feynman and Freeman Dyson.

Night owl or morning bird?

I probably have 30-hour days. If I’m busy and engaged, I don’t go to sleep. But I try and go to bed between midnight and 1 a.m. so I can wake up between 6 and 7 in the morning.

If you had a parrot, what is the first word it would have picked up from you?

“Holy!” Like in holy cow. Honestly, it would probably be an expletive. I can be colorful in five languages.

Silicon Valley’s best-kept secret?

The combination of wealth and multiculturalism can’t be overstated. My wife is Chinese and she said she has better access to Chinese food here than anywhere else, except when we lived in Shanghai.