Steve Westly

Westly was born in Arcadia, California. Raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, Westly received an A.B. in history from Stanford University in 1978, where he served as student body co-president. He received an M.B.A. in Public Management from the Stanford Graduate School of Business in 1983.

He married Anita Yu (Chinese: 余慧雯), an immigrant from Hong Kong, in 1997. They have a daughter, Christina, born in 2000, and a son, Matthew, born in 2001.

His brother, Dean Westly, practices law in the Silicon Valley region of Northern California where he advises high tech companies.

A member of the Democratic Party, Westly worked for Congressman Leo Ryan in 1978 as his first job out of college. Later that year, after Ryan's death on foreign soil at the hands of the Peoples Temple cult, he worked in the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Solar and Conservation under President Jimmy Carter until 1980. After working in the Carter Administration, he joined the California Public Utilities Commission as Assistant to the President.[2]

In 1983, Westly became the New Business Manager at Sprint Telecommunications. In 1986, he became an investment banker at Valentine and Company (later called Bridgemere Capital) in San Francisco. In 1988, Westly became President of Codd & Date, a leading relational database consulting & services firm. In 1991, Westly became the Deputy Director of the City of San Jose Office of Economic Development and began teaching at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, a position he held for the next five years.

In 1994, he became the Director of Netcom, one of the early large internet service providers and in 1995, became Vice President of WhoWhere?, then the largest Internet directory. In 1997, Westly joined eBay as one of its early executives. He began as Vice President and subsequently gained the title of Senior Vice President for Marketing, Business Development, and International. He retired from eBay in 2000 when he and his wife, Anita Yu, established the Steve and Anita Westly Foundation.

In March 2007, Westly joined the board of Tesla Motors, a pioneering northern California manufacturer of electric sports cars. He is now a Managing Partner and founder of The Westly Group, one of the larger venture funds in the US focusing on smart energy, mobility, buildings, and cities.  The firm has successfully raised three funds and has 13 of the world's larger energy and auto companies as investors. The Westly Group has had four companies go public on NASDAQ including Tesla Motors.  

Westly was an investor and board member of the adtech firm RadiumOne, whose founder, Gurbaksh Chahal, was charged with domestic violence and eventually pled guilty to two misdemeanor counts. Westly agreed that Chahal should pay former San Francisco mayor Willie Brown a $250,000 retainer to provide legal representation in order pursue a legal settlement with the district attorney. In a meeting with Chahal, Brown said his legal services may cost upwards of $1 million. After the video of the incident was ruled inadmissible, Brown returned $198,400 of the initial retainer. The RadiumOne board fired Chahal after he pled guilty. [4]

Steve Westly also served as a lecturer at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business from 1991-1995. He returned to teach a new course at Stanford Business School called “The Policy, Politics, and Finance for Solving Global Warming” in Spring of 2020.[3]

Steve Westly at the 'Tech Titans' Dinner in 2011 with President Obama, Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, and more.

In addition to his professional career, Westly has maintained a concurrent career in the Democratic Party. At age 23 in 1981, he was elected as Northern Treasurer of the California Democratic Party, the youngest party officer ever. He was subsequently elected State Controller of the California Democratic Party in 1983, Northern Chair of the California Democratic Party in 1985, and Vice Chair of the California Democratic Party in 1987. In 1989, he was defeated as State Chair of the California Democratic Party by Jerry Brown. Despite that loss, Westly continued his activism within the party by being elected to the Democratic National Committee in 1988, as the highest vote getter, and was reelected in 1992, 1996, and 2000.

Westly ran for California State Controller in 2002 against State Senator Tom McClintock and won by a margin of 22,730 votes (out of 7,258,758 votes cast). Westly garnered 3,289,839 (45.4%) votes while McClintock won the support of 3,273,028 (45.1%) people. Three other candidates won 695,891 (9.5%) votes.

On June 19, 2005, Westly announced his candidacy for California governor. Despite entering the race long after his primary opponent, California State Treasurer Phil Angelides, Westly's campaign picked up considerable momentum, receiving endorsements from such figures as Lieutenant Governor Cruz Bustamante, Congressmembers Grace Napolitano, Diane Watson, and Brad Sherman, State Senators Carole Migden, Martha Escutia, and Nell Soto, County Supervisor Yvonne Burke, Assembly Members Judy Chu, Ted Lieu, Rudy Bermudez, and Nicole Parra, former Assembly Speaker and current Los Angeles City Councilman Herb Wesson, the majority of the Los Angeles City Council, and other elected officials at the federal, state, and local levels. Westly also gained the support of 85% of the major newspapers that endorsed in the race, including the San Francisco Chronicle, San Jose Mercury News, Los Angeles Daily News, LA Weekly, Fresno Bee, and many others. Several organizations also endorsed Westly, such as the California Sierra Club, California Police Chiefs Association, California NOW, and the Orange County Professional Firefighters Association.

In the months leading up to the election, Westly overcame an early Angelides advantage and gained the edge in various polls, leading by as much as 13 points. Moreover, unlike Angelides, he consistently beat Governor Schwarzenegger in hypothetical general election matchups.

Despite Westly's momentum and resources, the California Democratic Party endorsed Angelides at the State Democratic Party Convention. The race turned extremely negative, highlighting environmental controversies surrounding Angelides' background as a real estate developer and Westly's broken pledge to keep his campaign clean. Westly's candidacy also was hurt by an unprecedented multi-million dollar independent expenditure by Sacramento real estate developer and longtime Angelides patron Angelo Tsakopoulos. As election day neared, Westly's momentum dissipated and the race tightened. A Field Poll held on June 2, 2006 had Westly leading Angelides by one percentage point, 35% to 34% with 26% undecided and an error size of +/- 4.5 points.[8]

The high number of undecided voters led to the lowest turnout in a California primary election in over half a century. Despite over $80 million spent on the race, including over $35 million of Westly's personal fortune, only 30.8% of California Democrats came out to vote, the lowest number in recent history. Angelides finished on election night with 48% of the vote compared to Westly's 44%. Westly endorsed Angelides' candidacy at a unity breakfast the morning after election night.

Angelides' Republican opponent, Arnold Schwarzenegger, has since used quotes from Westly's campaign to attack Angelides. Westly, who endorsed Angelides after the primary, countered, "Governor Schwarzenegger has shown great interest in what Steve Westly has to say about 2006. He is right here to tell you that we all need to vote for the Democratic candidate Phil Angelides in November 2006."[9]

Phil Angelides was defeated in a landslide by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger during the general election held on November 7, 2006 .[10]

After the election of President Barack Obama in November 2008, it was rumored that Westly was being considered for appointment as Secretary of Energy, though Dr. Steven Chu was ultimately named to that position.[11]

Westly's name was also figured in political speculation as a possible candidate for Governor to succeed Schwarzenegger in 2010. Former Governor Jerry Brown won the Democratic nomination and defeated Republican Meg Whitman (also a former eBay executive) in November 2010. Westly supported Brown for governor and hosted a Brown fundraiser in October 2010.

He was rumored to run again for Governor of California in 2018, however he did not file to run before the primary.[12]

Westly returned to teach a new course at Stanford Business School called “The Policy, Politics, and Finance for Solving Global Warming” in Spring of 2020.

• California Leadership Committee
• The Westly Group
• The Westly Foundation