Donald Lucas

Donald Alexander Lucas was born May 24, 1962, in Stanford, California, and grew up in Atherton with his sisters Nancy and Allie. He was a proud second-generation venture capitalist — the son of legendary Silicon Valley financier Donald L. Lucas, the early backer and longtime chairman of Oracle. Don earned a B.A. in Economics from Santa Clara University in 1984 and immediately joined his father at 3000 Sand Hill Road, spending roughly a decade at Sand Hill Financial Company backing companies such as Oracle, Cadence Design Systems, and Macromedia.

In 1993 (some firm materials cite 1995) he founded RWI Group, where as Managing General Partner he oversaw investments in more than 35 private companies and served on boards including KhiMetrics and DexCom. In 2007 he founded Lucas Venture Group, a boutique early-stage firm that would ultimately raise over $90 million across six funds and roughly three dozen special-purpose vehicles. Over a ~35-year career he built a reputation for hands-on, network-driven investing across stages.

Don's most personal investment story was Dexcom, the continuous glucose monitoring company: after his daughter Mary was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes in 1998, he became a founding investor and a committed philanthropist in the diabetes space, supporting JDRF and Beyond Type 1 (which his wife Sarah co-founded). He often framed his work as "using venture capital to make the world better." Santa Clara University later established the Lucas Institute for Venture Ethics tied to the family's legacy. Don died on January 28, 2020, in Portola Valley, California, survived by his wife Sarah and their four children.

• People-first thesis: LVG's stated philosophy is "We believe in people. Who you invest in is just as important as what you invest in" — leaning on a network cultivated across six decades of family venture experience.
• Stage: Early-stage — seed and Series A rounds.
• Check size: $500,000 to $5,000,000 per investment, often deployed via dedicated funds and special-purpose vehicles.
• Sectors: Robotics and transformative autonomous machines, networking, software analytics / big data, AI/ML, cyber security, SaaS, fintech, medical devices, space technology, and social-purpose / mission-driven ventures.
• Value-add: A hands-on approach combining capital, strategic guidance, operational help, and warm introductions from an extensive Silicon Valley network.
• Mission lens: A recurring willingness to back companies that improve lives (e.g., diabetes technology), reflecting Don's own "make the world better" framing.