Events
Past Event
Entrepreneur-In-Residence: Don Parsons
Farley Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation
2:30 PM
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Ford Motor Company Engineering Design Center
Details
Have any questions about your startup? Sign up to talk with our Entrepreneur-In-Residence, Don Parsons, on April 28.
Don Parsons is an experienced venture capitalist, having spent the last 26 years investing in and helping grow technology companies. He is a seasoned General Partner of 4 Venture Capital funds totaling over $840 million in capital and has knowledge and/or oversight of over 140 private venture capital investments. He is a current or former Board of Director member of more than 20 companies.
Don is currently a member of the Venture Capital Group of Liberty Global, the largest international cable and Broadband Company with operations in over 14 countries. His current investments include: Revolv (sold to NEST/Google), EdgeConnex, Thuuz, Personify, Veniam and SundaySky.
Don previously founded Appian Ventures in 2002 and raised an $80 million venture capital fund that invested in 20 software and technology companies including LeftHand Networks (acquired by HP), Collective Intellect (acquired by Oracle), CareFX (acquired by Harris Corporation), AuctionPay (acquired by Global Payments), and Ping Identity.
Don founded Strategos Ventures, LLC in 2000 to make Angel investments in technology companies along with investments in venture capital funds. Angel investments include LeftHand Networks, Stratis Business Centers (acquired by Regus PLC), Lijit Networks (acquired by Federated Media), and Albeo Technologies (acquired by GE). Venture Capital Fund investments include Silicon Valley BancVentures, Vanguard Venture Partners, and Sequel Venture Partners.
Don also spent 11 years at Denver based Centennial Ventures, a venture capital firm managing over $600 million focused on media and technology investments. He invested or oversaw investments in Verio ($8 billion acquisition by NTT), HighGround Systems (acquired by Sun Microsystems), Raindance Communications (IPO, acquired by West Media), Cypress Communications (IPO), Pluto Technologies (acquired by AVID), and Tricord Systems (IPO).
Prior to his career in venture capital, Don was a Northwestern University Cooperative Engineer and then a full-time Product Design Engineer with IBM's Personal Computer Division in Boca Raton, Florida where he received a patent for innovative features of the graphics hardware (MCGA and VGA) for the IBM PS/2 line of computers introduced in 1987.
Don was a founding board member of Colorado's chapter of the National Association of Corporate Directors. He is the former President and Chairman of the Rocky Mountain Venture Capital Association and a former member of the Board of Trustees of the Graland Country Day School. Don holds a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the Northwestern University McCormick School of Engineering and an M.B.A. from the University of Michigan Ross School of Business.
Time
Thursday, April 28, 2016 at 2:30 PM - 5:00 PM
Location
Ford Motor Company Engineering Design Center Map
Contact
Calendar
Farley Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation
Center for Synthetic Biology presents: Dario Robleto | Ancient Beacons Long for Notice
Block Museum of Art
3:00 PM
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Block Museum of Art, Mary and Leigh
Details
The Center for Synthetic Biology, in collaboration with the Block Museum of Art at Northwestern, is pleased to welcome Dario Robleto, award-winning multi-media artist, for a screening of his film Ancient Beacons Long for Notice. This third part of Robleto’s trilogy explores the legacy of the “Golden Record”—a gold disc representing Earth's diverse life and cultures, sent beyond our solar system on NASA’s Voyager space probes. The film asks a core question:“ is our moral obligation to fully account for our actions—the good and the bad—in perpetuity, off-planet, and to beings we have yet to confirm exist?” A community conversation after the screening will explore this question in the context of synthetic biology’s history, encouraging us to consider its ethical implications as we forecast the future.
Dario Robleto’s work has been widely exhibited and is held in prominent collections, including the Whitney Museum of American Art and the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D. C. A portfolio of the artists prints titled The First Time, The Heart (A Portrait of Life 1854–1913) was acquired by the Block in 2018 with support of Northwestern Engineering. His work has also been featured in numerous media outlets, including Krista Tippett’s On Being and The New York Times. Robleto has held numerous artist-in-residence positions at prestigious institutions, including the Smithsonian Museum of American History and the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard. In 2025, he received an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Middlebury College.
From 2018 to 2023, Robleto Served as Artist-at-Large at Northwestern University’s McCormick School of Engineering and the Block Museum of Art, where he developed and screened the first two parts of his trilogy about the history of the heart and the Golden Record. The residency culminated in the exhibition The Heart’s Knowledge: Science and Empathy in the Art of Dario Robleto, as well as a publication of the same name. During his time at Northwestern, Robleto built strong ties with the Center for Synthetic Biology and explored the intersection of art, technology, and ethics in society.
This event leads up to the Center for Synthetic Biology’s 10-year Anniversary, where Robleto is leading the development of a time capsule representing the future of synthetic biology at Northwestern and in the world.
Event Details - Northwestern University, Evanston Campus
📅 Wednesday, April 15, 2026
🕒 3:00–5:00 PM | Film Screening & Discussion
📍 The Block Museum of Art
Time
Wednesday, April 15, 2026 at 3:00 PM - 5:00 PM
Location
Block Museum of Art, Mary and Leigh Map
Contact
Calendar
Block Museum of Art