Walter is a Former Managing Director of Summit Partners. He joined the firm in 1989 and has served as a board director for more than 30 companies, including 10 public companies. During his tenure at Summit, he served on Summit’s executive committee and was a Managing Director until 2010, a member of Summit’s Board of Managers until 2017, and a Senior Advisor until 2018.
Walter’s past directorships include Chairman of E-TEK Dynamics (NASDAQ: ETEK, later merged with JDS Uniphase), McAfee (NYSE: MFE, later acquired by Intel), HMT Technology (NASDAQ: HMTT, later acquired by Komag), Diamond Multimedia Systems (NASDAQ: DIMD, later acquired by SONICblue), AltoCom (acquired by Broadcom), Finisar (NASDAQ: FNSR, later acquired by II-VI), NetCom Systems (acquired by Bowthorpe), and Xylan (NASDAQ: XYLN, later acquired by Alcatel).
Prior to Summit, Walter was a Vice President and Associate at Crosspoint Venture Partners and a software engineer in the computer graphics field. He received a BS in engineering, with honors, from Oregon State University, an MS in engineering from Caltech, and an MBA from UCLA.
Walter was named to the Forbes Midas List from 2007 to 2010. He is a member of the Board of Trustees at Caltech and a former director of the National Venture Capital Association. He and his wife Marcia are active philanthropists having established the Kortschak Scholars program for incoming Ph.D. students in computer science at Caltech and the Kortschak Center for Learning and Creativity at the University of Southern California.
