Richard Sudek
Golden Seeds, Silicon Valley

Richard Sudek, Ph.D. is UCI’s Chief Innovation Officer and Executive Director of UCI Applied Innovation. Sudek earned a Ph.D. in management and master’s degrees in business administration and organizational behavior at Claremont Graduate University. His research focuses on the angel investment decision process, examining how and why angel investors choose their investments.

Sudek received a B.S. in Information and Computer Sciences from UCI in 1981. He founded Nadek Computer Systems, a data networking design business and served as its CEO for 17 years. In 1999, he sold the company to Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), an international firm and was a vice president at SAIC before pursuing his academic career.

Universities and businesses throughout the world have benefited from Sudek’s expertise in entrepreneurial finance, strategy, and leadership, as well as angel investing, executive coaching and business partnerships. He has served as an advisor to several MBA programs, served as a reviewer for the National Science Foundation, and has judged business plan competitions in the U.S. and Europe. He has taught entrepreneurship at Chapman University, INSEAD in France, the Rotterdam School of Management in the Netherlands, U.C. at Irvine, and the Peter F. Drucker & Masatoshi Ito Graduate School of Management at Claremont Graduate University. He also has served on advisory committees for Microsoft, IBM, and Cisco.

Sudek has been an active angel investor through direct investment and angel funds since 2000. He has served on the Angel Capital Association board, a national trade group, and is Chairman Emeritus of Tech Coast Angels (TCA), the largest angel organization in the U.S. investing $255+ million in over 465 startup companies. In addition, these companies have attracted over $1.8 billion in follow on investments. He is also a member of Golden Seeds (the largest angel group in the U.S. focused on women-led startups), which has invested over $135M in approximately 200 companies. Sudek has screened over 1,000 startup companies, and currently sits on the TCA Board of Governors, as well as an advisor to venture funds, academic centers, engineering, and high-tech firms.