Born on August 5, 1967, he is an American author, venture capitalist, and internet entrepreneur. Hoffman was co-founder and executive chairman of LinkedIn, a business-oriented social network primarily used for professional networking. He is currently a partner at the venture capital firm Greylock Partners. On the Forbes 2019 list of the world’s billionaires, Hoffman ranked number 1,349 with a net worth of $1.8 billion.
Early Life and Education
Hoffman was born in Palo Alto, California, to Deanna Ruth (Rutter) and William Parker Hoffman Jr., and grew up in Berkeley, California. His paternal great-great-grandfather was Theophilus Adam Wylie, a Presbyterian Christian minister and acting president of Indiana University. Hoffman’s uncle, Eric Hoffman, is a writer.
Hoffman described himself as an avid tabletop role-playing gamer as a child. His first paid job (at age 12) was as an editor for the game company Chaosium, then based in Oakland, near his home. Although only 14 years old at the time, Hoffman’s name appeared on the box of Chaosium’s 1982 RuneQuest release Borderlands, receiving the same credit as game designers Steve Perrin, Sandy Petersen, and Greg Stafford.
He attended high school at The Putney School, where he tapped maple syrup, drove oxen, and studied epistemology. He graduated from Stanford University in 1990, where he won a Marshall Scholarship and a Dinkelspiel Award, earning a B.S. in Symbolic Systems and Cognitive Science. He then completed an M.St. in Philosophy at Wolfson College, Oxford, in 1993 as a Marshall Scholar.
Hoffman co-founded LinkedIn in December 2002 with two former colleagues from SocialNet (including Allen Blue), a former college classmate, and a former colleague from his time at Fujitsu. The platform was launched on May 5, 2003, as one of the first online business-oriented social networks. Peter Thiel and Keith Rabois, Hoffman’s colleagues at PayPal, were early investors in LinkedIn.
By November 2014, LinkedIn had more than 332 million members in over 200 countries and territories. The site allows registered users to create professional profiles and connect with one another. Users can invite anyone (whether a site user or not) to become a connection. According to Forbes, “LinkedIn is by far the most advantageous social networking tool available to job seekers and business professionals today.”
Hoffman served as LinkedIn’s founding CEO for the first four years before becoming President and Head of Products in February 2007. He became Executive Chairman in June 2009. Following LinkedIn’s IPO on May 19, 2011, Hoffman held a stake valued at an estimated $2.34 billion, excluding potential returns through Greylock Partners, where he became a partner in 2009. Hoffman believes many people still don’t know how to use the service effectively, and it’s LinkedIn’s job to help them. In an interview, Hoffman said, “You have to think proactively about how to use a tool that allows you to move in ways you previously couldn’t—and most people aren’t very good at that.”
Microsoft proposed acquiring LinkedIn on June 13, 2016, for $26.2 billion in cash. Hoffman joined Microsoft’s board of directors on March 14, 2017.