Dean Linden

Advisory Board, 100 Urban Entrepreneurs

Born in Regina, Saskatchewan, and raised in the small town of Medicine Hat, Alberta, Dean Linden got his start in professional baseball — by age 19, he had become the general manager of the Medicine Hat Blue Jays (the rookie-league affiliate of the Toronto Blue Jays), making him the youngest GM in pro baseball at the time.

He later moved to Vancouver and earned his securities license, and in 1997 he joined ID Biomedical Corp., a startup biotech company. With the business in dire financial straits a year later, Linden invested personal funds to help sustain it — a risk rewarded when ID Biomedical became a global leader in flu-vaccine manufacturing and was acquired by GlaxoSmithKline in 2005 for $1.7 billion.

In 2008, Linden was introduced to Magnus Greaves, the cofounder of 100 Urban Entrepreneurs, and has since assumed a role on the foundation’s advisory board. “I feel incredibly fortunate to have met with many of these wonderful entrepreneurs,” he says of his 100UE experience. “I’ve made a living investing in people and businesses for the past 15 years — and I feel strongly that these young people will take the funding and mentorship provided by 100UE and not only change their lives and the lives of their families, but change the fabric of the American economy. Business plans can be adjusted and refined, but you cannot teach the work ethic that you witness among these exceptional young entrepreneurs.”

Linden lives with his wife and two children in Washington state.