University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
The Grainger College of Engineering

Dan Caruso

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For his exceptional career as a chief executive officer and entrepreneur in the communications industry and his engagement with the University of Illinois.

Founding CEO, Chairman of Zayo Group
Managing Director, Caruso Ventures

  • BS, Mechanical Engineering, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 1986
  • MBA, Booth School of Business, The University of Chicago, 1992

Dan Caruso is Founding CEO and Chairman of Zayo Group. Caruso co-founded Zayo in 2007 and completed its IPO in 2014. Through organic expansion and 45 acquisitions, Zayo amassed one of the largest commercial fiber networks in the world, which provides mission critical bandwidth to impactful countries across the globe. With the backing of Digital Colony Partners and EQT Infrastructure, Zayo once again became a private company at a $14.3 billion valuation in March 2020. Zayo’s equity investment of just over $1 billion became worth $8.5 billion at exit.  

Including Zayo, Caruso has been a part of three fiber startups that have eclipsed valuations of $10 billion. The first was MFS Communications, which was a pioneer in competing with the Bell system during the initial commercialization of the Internet. The second was Level 3 Communications, where Caruso joined as a founding executive and was accountable for engineering, construction, operations, and products. Caruso began his career at Illinois Bell/Ameritech. He was the President and CEO of ICG Communications, where he led the take-private buyout. In 2006, ICG was sold, which yielded a return of approximately 25X the $8.7M investment. Additionally, Caruso is an investor in several Colorado scaleups, including ColdQuanta, Arryved, Ninja Nation, and Spark Grills. He helped launch Envysion, another Colorado company, and served as its chairman from 2006 to 2013.   

Caruso is a strong supporter of the entrepreneurial community in both Colorado and Chicago and has a specific interest in the intersection between for-profit impact investing, inclusion and entrepreneurship. Caruso serves as Chairman of the Board for Endeavor Colorado and serves on the boards of University of Chicago’s Polsky Center and CU Boulder’s Chancellor Strategic Advisory Council. He was the original steering committee chairman for the Blackstone Entrepreneurs Network and supported Startup Summer from its inception. Caruso supports Endeavor Global, CU’s New Venture Challenge, Greenhouse Scholars, Access Opportunity and University of Chicago’s New Venture Challenge. In 2015, Caruso and his wife Cindy established the Caruso Family Foundation to support initiatives that foster entrepreneurship, innovation, and inclusion. 

Current as of March 2021