Mark Fernandes

Managing Director, Sierra Ventures

Mark Fernandes is a Managing Director at Sierra Ventures and focuses on software investments in the consumer internet and enterprise areas. His investments include Frontbridge Technologies (acquired by Microsoft), Sourcefire (NASD: FIRE) and Opalis Software (acquired by Microsoft). He was also a board observer at Net6 (acquired by Citrix Systems) and Permeo (acquired by Blue Coat Systems). He serves on the boards of Ooyala, Spotzer Media, DynamicOps and ThisMoment. Mark started his career in engineering at Seagate Technology and was then a product manager at Cisco Systems. After business school, Mark was an equity research analyst covering software companies, first at Robertson Stephens and then as a Director at Merrill Lynch. He joined Sierra Ventures in 2002. Mark has a MS in Mechanical Engineering from UC Berkeley and a MBA from Harvard.

Articles by Mark Fernandes

Unblocking Startup Growth: Best Practices for Sales Discovery & Qualification with Richard Harris

Startups are in a constant race against time and resources, navigating complex sales environments with lean teams and limited margins for error. In a recent session from the Mucker Growth...

The LinkedIn Playbook: How Startup Founders Can Stand Out & Scale

This LinkedIn Playbook is based on insights from a recent one-time Mucker Growth Session webinar featuring LinkedIn growth experts Alec Paul (Founder of SalesBrand) and Kyle Williams (Founder of Brickstack)....

DeepSeek vs OpenAI: Comparison Breakdown and What It Means For Your Tech Startup With Dan Cleary

In this recent webinar of our Mucker Growth Series, we discussed the evolving AI landscape with Dan Cleary, founder of PromptHub. He provided an in-depth breakdown of DeepSeek vs. OpenAI,...

Building Product Without Knowing Code With Adam New Waterson

In a deep dive into AI-driven product development, Adam New-Waterson, a former CMO turned Chief Product Officer and now solopreneur, shared how non-technical founders can harness the power of AI...

How To Build An Automated Sales Outreach Engine For Startups with ColdIQ

Many B2B startups (and even larger organizations) are unable to be successful with their outbound sales strategy because they take a lazy, “batch-and-blast” approach. In a recent Mucker Growth Series...

Navigating the AI Sales Tools Landscape To Grow Your Startup With Blue Bowen

We had the privilege of hosting, Eugene “Blue” Bowen, Research Principal from G2, one of the leading software marketplaces and review sites that cover a broad range of B2B solutions....