New Companies, Lots of Jobs

Two large white party tents sat empty in White Plaza for two days – and then on Thursday – they filled with undergraduate students, graduate students and recruiters from 66 fast growing start-ups. In addition to giving away pens, t-shirts, chattering teeth and jolly ranchers all of these recruiters were looking to hand out jobs.

“This is nothing like the career fairs when I was graduating from college,” said Matt Brezina from Xobni, a start-up company that aggregates personal information stored in email systems. “It felt like no one was hiring in 2001 and 2002. Now there are amazing opportunities out there,” he said. Xobni just closed a series A round of financing and is looking to add a handful of developers to its three person team.

“We are growing fast,” said Genelle Hung from ZipLip, a software start-up focused on email archiving. “We currently have 40–50 employees and we plan to double within the next year,” she said. “If you are a solid engineer and you have some business skills you are in high demand right now,” Hung said.

The majority of the companies participating in the fair were young internet related ventures. However there were a few exceptions. KiteShip Corporation, a company that designs “very large free flying sails” for cargo ships in order to reduce their fuel consumption, sponsored a table. So did GE Global Research, the company that “built the systems that brought electricity and light to the world,” according to their company literature.

“It is great to see so many companies out here celebrating and looking for the entrepreneurial spirit,” Hung said. Recruiters and students alike appeared in to be in high spirits from the time the tents opened at 10 am until they closed at 4 pm.

“In total I would say about 600 students attended the fair,” said Sunil Parekh ’08 a Biomechanical Engineer major who helped organize the event. “In the morning there were a lot of graduate students because undergraduates don’t get up that early. This afternoon we had a good mix,” he said.

“The turn out has been good. We have met really good people,” said Shiri Azenot from Sharpcast, a company developing software that synchronizes digital media and information.

“I met high quality students and a good amount of engineers,” said Sandi Sayama of RockYou, a widget platform backed by Sequoia Capital, Lightspeed Partners, and FirstRound Capital. Sayama collected about 50 resumes over the course of the day.

The event was organized by Business Association of Stanford Entrepreneurial Students (BASES). The student group aims to “build the next generation of entrepreneurs by facilitating networking, discussion, education, and hands-on experience.”