Jay Larson
Operating Partner
Jay Larson is an Operating Advisor at Thoma Bravo. Jay has an impressive track record as a successful
CEO, transformation driver, and value-creating leader of world-class enterprise organizations. He served
as CEO at Optimizely, a venture-backed software company that he and his team grew and ultimately
sold to a PE-owned software company. Before Optimizely, Jay was the CEO at Birst Software, another
venture-backed firm that was sold to a large application software company. Jay also has an outstanding
record as a leader of sales organizations. At Mercury Interactive, he spent seven years building the go-
to-market team that drove Mercury’s revenue from $300 million to over $1 billion. During his five-year
tenure at SuccessFactors, he built a global sales team that drove revenue from $80 million to over $360
million when SuccessFactors was acquired by SAP. Jay also held sales leadership positions at Oracle,
Siebel Systems, and Jive Software. He is passionate about helping companies sell more and sell more
efficiently. Jay has a BA degree in Economics from Harvard University and an MBA from the Anderson
School of Management at UCLA.