We’re excited to announce that Comcast Ventures Managing Director and Head of Funds Amy Banse has joined the board of directors of Adobe Systems Inc. Amy joins Frank Calderoni, EVP and CFO of Cisco; and Laura Desmond, global CEO of Starcom MediaVest Group as three new members joining Adobe’s board.

“We are pleased to welcome three individuals of this caliber to our board of directors,” John Warnock and Chuck Geschke, co-chairmen of the board, Adobe, said in a statement announcing the news. “Amy Banse, Frank Calderoni and Laura Desmond bring deep expertise in media and technology to our board, which are critical to our mission of being the category leader in digital media and digital marketing.”

Adobe is already doing great things in digital media, building on its impressive suite of products that include Adobe Flash, Adobe AIR, Adobe Reader, Acrobat, Photoshop and more. We’re excited for Amy’s opportunity to help them scale even more.

We’re pleased to see that Comcast Ventures’ Head of Funds and Managing Director Amy Banse appears on a fantastic list of 105 women in venture capital and angel investing, put together by Melissa Pierce, a filmmaker and organizer of the Pitch Conference, with the help of readers who continue to add names to make it comprehensive.

The list appears on the TechCocktail blog at this link.

There’s been a lot of talk lately about women in tech, business and investing – or mainly a lack thereof. We’re happy to see someone shine a light on all the women who currently are working in the investing arena, and of course the mention and recognition of our own head of funds.

Congratulations to DreamIt Ventures, which was ranked #3 on Forbes’ list of Top U.S. Incubators and Accelerators! DreamIt Ventures has accelerator programs in Philadelphia, New York and Israel. Comcast Ventures is an investor in the DreamIt Access program, which aims to launch 15 minority-led startups in New York in a year.

Startup accelerators have emerged as highly sought-after opportunities that have acceptance rates lower than most Ivy League universities. Entrepreneurs who are selected for the DreamIt program receive access to mentoring, coaching, investors and a community of supportive fellow entrepreneurs. Each founding team member receives $5,000, and each company receives $5,000 for a maximum total stipend of $25,000.

DreamIt Ventures has 65 portfolio companies, including SVNGR/Level Up. We’re thrilled to be part of this exciting incubator!

Click here to read the full article on Forbes.

We moved to San Francisco seven months ago. It’s a wonderful city – beautiful vistas, incredible light, happy people and smart people all looking to change the world. Every other person on the street is either starting a company or investing in one. For a newcomer, the concentration of ideas and entrepreneurs in the 30-mile radius that is Silicon Valley is thrilling – a virtual petri dish of possibility.

Precisely because Silicon Valley is such a hotbed of entrepreneurial activity, it attracts extraordinary people willing to invest extraordinary sums. In the past 12 months, the Valley’s top firms have raised funds of over $500 million, the largest being Andreessen Horowitz’ fund III at $1.2 billion. In 2011 alone, Internet-specific companies received a total of $6.9 billion spread across 997 VC deals, an increase of 68 percent in dollars and 24 percent in number of deals from the previous year.

Not only is the startup world competitive for startups themselves, but also venture capitalists now have a lot of competition as each firm vies with the others to deploy each dollar in the best, most promising companies and ideas. Where does Comcast Ventures fit into the mix? What are our goals and how do our dollars differ from the others?

I joined Comcast in 1991 at a time when we had just over 1 million subscribers. We were not a new company, but one with most of its growth still ahead. Today we have over 25 million cable subscribers, 17 million high-speed Internet customers and 1 million small- to medium-sized business Internet subscribers. In January 2011, we purchased 51% of NBCUniversal with its broadcast reach in to over 110 million households and its studio and theme parks. Of the 102,000 employees who work at Comcast and NBCUniversal, the vast majority spend each day delivering the premium products and services at the core of our company.

Then there are the 20 of us at Comcast Ventures. Our job is different. We are looking for what comes next. We want to deploy our assets, our experience and our platform on behalf of startups. Even as our colleagues run the company on a daily basis, we hope to harness the company in support of new businesses to grow value.

I’ve been at this for seven months and the more I do it the more excited I become by the potential of our approach and our platform. It’s a rare company that we can’t help in some way. We are a media and entertainment company, so startups exploring digital media, second screen experiences, over-the-top video and bandwidth expansion are natural fits. But, we are also much more: a large enterprise seeking innovative healthcare solutions for our employee base, the largest buyer and seller of advertising in the U.S., and a huge customer of database services. We own a pipe that is capable of delivering the bandwidth that makes home entertainment possible. But beyond that, many of our subscribers are looking to technology to improve all aspects of their lives, not just their entertainment.

If as Marc Andreessen claims, software is eating the world, then we are nicely positioned to support that revolution.

By Richard Grant, Senior Associate

Hello! Since this is my first blog post at Comcast Ventures, I wanted to take this opportunity to introduce myself and tell you a bit about why I’m here and what I do.

I joined Comcast Ventures about 15 months ago after spending the first 10 years of my career in Strategic Planning/Business Development (Comcast Interactive Media, Sony Pictures) and Professional Services (Lehman Brothers Investment Banking). So how did I make the transition to venture capital? Good question. And one not easily answered. Obviously, there is a little bit (maybe a lot) of luck involved. Venture Capital is a small fraternity so being at the right place at the right time has a lot to do with it. But I subscribe to the belief/theory that: “Luck is at the intersection of preparation and opportunity.” The opportunity presented itself and I was ready to make the move.

Investing isn’t something you wake up one morning and decide to do. I’ve thought about moving to the investment side for many years and even came dangerously close to accepting a couple of private equity jobs in 2004. I didn’t take those positions for a number of reasons, both personally and professionally but suffice it to say that I’ve been interested in and intrigued by the potential of becoming a professional investor for a long time. And while I spent the first part of my career doing other things, I feel that the skills I built up, the relationships I forged and the appreciation that I developed for operations, product, engineering, marketing/sales and finance through my previous operating roles have prepared me for venture investing and provided me with enormous context for how a company is built, operates and ultimately succeeds.

I also firmly believe that venture investing and entrepreneurship are in my blood. My grandfather, father and multiple uncles are all entrepreneurs and angel investors. They’ve started and run businesses ranging from liquor stores to healthcare consulting companies. And while I’m not starting a business myself, I have tremendous respect and appreciation for those who are starting businesses, and I’m excited by the prospect of working with these entrepreneurs to realize their vision. That’s really why this job is so awesome.

Given my background in media and entertainment (Sony Pictures, Comcast Interactive Media) and my passion for it (I’m a TV and sports junkie), I tend to focus on consumer businesses such as media and commerce. I’ve also been working very closely with David Horowitz here at Comcast Ventures around launching an investment platform in the education vertical. While it may not be immediately obvious, we strongly believe that there is a convergence occurring between education and entertainment. Many education-focused businesses – particularly those that have direct-to-consumer offerings – look a lot like media businesses, which consist of content aggregation/development, delivery of content to multiple platforms, marketing to/acquiring users. And having a lot of personal exposure to and passion for education (nearly everyone in my wife’s family is a teacher or school administrator), I am really excited to be investing in the sector. Stay tuned!