Jim McKelvey

Jim McKelvey is an American entrepreneur, businessperson and philanthropist. McKelvey was appointed as an Independent Director of the St. Louis Federal Reserve in January 2017.

James Morgan (Jim) McKelvey Jr. was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri and is a Distinguished Alumnus of Ladue Horton Watkins High School. He wrote and published a Handbook on UCSD and Apple Pascal. After graduation from Washington University in St. Louis, McKelvey worked as a contractor for IBM in Los Angeles and in St. Louis. At the same time, he had jobs as a glassblowing instructor and founded Disconcepts, a CD cabinet manufacturing company.

Third Degree Glass Factory

In 2000, after giving a glassblowing demonstration at WUSTL, McKelvey met Doug Auer. In 2002 they founded Third Degree Glass Factory in St. Louis, a glass art education center and studio.

Square, Inc.

In 2009, McKelvey co-founded Square with Jack Dorsey. McKelvey designed the hardware used by Square in 2009 and served as the company’s chairman until 2010. In 2011, McKelvey's card reader design was inducted into the Museum of Modern Art. Today, McKelvey sits on the Board of Directors at Square.

Cultivation Capital

In 2012, McKelvey teamed with other St. Louis-based serial entrepreneurs to help found Cultivation Capital. The venture capital firm manages multiple early-stage venture capital funds in software, life sciences, and agtech.Cultivation Capital was identified by Crunchbase as the 7th most active venture capital firm founded since 2009, and the 3rd most active lead investor.

MoneyOnMobile

In May 2016, McKelvey joined the Board of Directors of MoneyOnMobile,Inc., which offers mobile money solutions through its Indian subsidiary MoneyOnMobile. This venture enables people in India to pay for goods and services and transfer money to other persons via their mobile phones.

The Federal Reserve

In 2017, McKelvey was appointed as an Independent Director of the St. Louis Federal Reserve.

LaunchCode

In September 2013, McKelvey co-founded LaunchCode, a non-profit organization that aims to grow new talent and create pathways to on-the-job training and employment. LaunchCode partners with companies to set up paid apprenticeships in technology for talented people who lack the traditional credentials to land a quality, high-paying job. In 2014, LaunchCode was named "The Best Thing to Happen to St. Louis" by the St. Louis Riverfront Times. In February 2019, LaunchCode received a $300,000 grant from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation to support education programming.

In 2016, McKelvey donated $15M to the Washington University School of Engineering and Applied Science to build a new computer science and engineering building named after his father. In 2019, Washington University's engineering school was renamed the James McKelvey School of Engineering after receiving the largest donation in the school's history from McKelvey.