Our Team

We have dedicated our careers to supporting great entrepreneurs and iconoclastic leaders in building good companies.

Dave Whorton profile

Dave Whorton
Daniel Benetz profile

Dan Benetz
Michelle Bitler profile

Michelle Bitler
Dave Whorton profile

Dave Whorton

In 2006, Dave founded Tugboat Ventures to invest in very early stage software and technology companies led by talented entrepreneurs and actively support them through their entire business lifecycle. Prior, Dave co-founded four companies including drugstore.com and Good Technology. He also invested at TPG Ventures and KPCB—working closely with Amazon, Google, Successfactors, and others in their earliest days. His career began with HP and Bain. Dave has a BS Mechanical Engineering from UC Berkeley and MBA from Stanford GSB.

Daniel Benetz profile

Dan Benetz

Dan is a finance professional with a focus on driving profitable growth in operating companies. Dan has been involved in growth and transition phases at Intel Corporation and other companies. Partnering with the business, he provided strong analytics, leveraged systems and drove operational efficiencies. Dan’s experience and leadership include international finance and partnership within the corporate venture arm. Tugboat provides an opportunity to have impact in partnership with a group of innovative leaders who have a passion to build meaningful, long-lasting and profitable businesses. He has a BS in Math-Applied Science from UCLA. Dan is based in Silicon Valley.

Michelle Bitler profile

Michelle Bitler

Michelle Bitler joins The Tugboat Group with over 20 years of accounting and financial experience. She is an east coast transplant where she gained corporate accounting experience in various industries from insurance companies to senior living services. Her areas of expertise are financial reporting, payroll and cash management. Michelle earned a bachelor’s degree in Accounting from York College of PA.