PR Honcho Turns Venture Capitalist With High-Profile Firm

This doesn't happen every day: Margit Wennmachers, head of tech PR firm Outcast Communications, has joined Andreessen Horowitz as a partner.

That's "Andreessen" as in Marc Andreessen, founder of Netscape and developer of the first successful web browser.

Kara Swisher got the scoop. She reports: "At Andreessen Horowitz, she’ll focus on bringing marketing expertise to the firm and its portfolio companies, starting in September."

I've pinged Margit with my congratulations and a request for an email interview about her new role. Stay tuned. Here's said Q&A but with Connie Loizos of peHub: http://www.pehub.com/74430/from-pr-to-vc-a-qa-with-the-newest-partner-at-andreessen-horowitz/. Key comment:

What does “partner” mean? Will you be evaluating deals? Will you, at some point, begin taking board seats?

Right now, Ben and Marc are the founding partners, and the only GPs and investing partners. I have a principal role in the firm in that I get to look at all the deals and go to pitch meetings and provide my feedback, but they’ll certainly make the final call and they’ll take the board seats in [those] cases where they take a seat.