Barbara Farrington

Deborah is co-founder and managing partner of New York City-based StarVest Partners, founded in 1998 to invest in technology-enabled business services. StarVest is one of the largest women majority owned venture capital firms. Its focus has been on software-as-a-service, digital marketing, and data & analytics. Notable investments include NetSuite (NYSE: N), which StarVest invested in when it had minimal revenues, and which was sold to ORCL for $9.2 billion in 2016 when it had $1 billion in revenues; she was lead director and chair of the Compensation Committee from the time in went public in 2007 until its sale. Other investments include the first internet insurance company, the first digital ad agency, and HR and financial infrastructure, SaaS solutions and leading marketing
technology companies. On behalf of StarVest, she currently serves on the boards of Planful, Xignite, and Snag Holdings, Inc. In addition, she is a director of NCR (NYSE: NCR) where she chairs the Compensation & Human Resources Committee; Ceridian HCM Holding (NYSE: CDAY) where she chairs the Nominating & Governance Committee; and Cumulus Media where she is a member of the Audit Committee. Earlier in her career she was president and CEO of Victory Ventures, a multi strategy investment firm headquartered in New York City, a managing director of Asian Oceanic Group in New York and Hong Kong, and an investment banker and division director of Merrill Lynch in New York, Hong Kong and Tokyo. She began her career after college and prior to HBS as a credit analyst at the Chase Manhattan Bank. She has been named multiple times to the Forbes Midas List of Top 100 Venture Capitalists and in 2018 received the Foreign Policy Association Medal for Achievement in Financial Services. She received an MBA from the Harvard Business School, where she has served on the Visiting Committee, as a Vice-President of the Alumni Association, endowed a Fellowship for Women Entrepreneurs and is a chair of the HBS Club of New York. She is a graduate of Smith College, where she was a Trustee for eight years and chaired its Investment Committee, responsible for its endowment. She currently serves as a member of the board of Trustees of the American Friends of the Victoria & Albert Museum in London and a board member of the Asolo Repertory Theatre in Sarasota, FL.