Eugene Saburi | At-large Trustee

Class of 1993, Bachelor of Arts, Japanese Language and Literature 

Why I Serve

I am a third-generation Husky. My grandfather was a professor at UW, and my father was a student. My wife is a Husky also, so you can see we have a lot of Husky pride in our family. I didn’t even apply to other schools because the thought never occurred to me go anywhere besides UW! I spent my childhood in Japan, and my family moved to the States when I was in high school. I remember going to Husky games with my dad and seeing and feeling the excitement of everyone who was a part of that. I was lucky enough to be in college during the vaunted years of the football program.

I’m an accidental techie — I graduated with a liberal arts degree in Japanese Language and Literature and ended up working for Microsoft in Japan. I spent almost 20 years splitting my time between Tokyo and Seattle before I took a job with Adobe in 2014. During this time, I joined the board for the UW Alumni Association Japan, and that’s how I started getting involved with the institution again. In 2018 I joined Washin Kai [Friends of Classical Japanese], a philanthropic organization that supports Japanese students at UW.

To this day, I still have relationships with a few of my professors. I’m still building on those relationships, and I hope that current students find the same lifetime connections I have. As I get older, I think more about purpose. In your 20s, you are focused on getting established, starting a career, and making money; by your 30s, you’re advancing your career, but as you get older your perspective and focus changes. Who I work for and what I do are important, but so is how I spend my time. Looking back, I am so grateful for the people who helped me along the way, and I hope that I can do the same.

Biography

Eugene Saburi is the Chief Business Officer of Treasure Data, a marketing technology company based in Mountain View, California. In this role, he is responsible for all customer-facing functions, including sales, marketing, professional services, and customer support. In 2019, Eugene co-founded GeoFusion, an advisory firm that helps late-stage technology start-ups with growth and international expansion. Before founding GeoFusion, Eugene served as the President of Adobe Systems in Japan, and he spent 19 years at Microsoft, where he held a variety of executive roles including General Manager in the Server and Tools business.