Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders (ETL)
Each week, experienced entrepreneurs and innovators come to Stanford University to candidly share lessons they've learned while developing, launching and scaling disruptive ideas. The Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders Series (ETL) is produced by the Stanford Technology Ventures Program (STVP) and published on eCorner by STVP.
Episodes
Ryan Nece (Next Legacy Partners) - Learning from Achievement and Adversity
Ryan Nece is co-founder and managing partner of Next Legacy Partners, a multi-strategy venture platform investing in established venture firms, emerging venture firms, and select technology companies. A former Super Bowl champion, Nece transitioned from professional sports to entrepreneurship, founding and scaling multiple businesses before co-founding Next Legacy. In this conversation wi
Jake Miller (Fellow) - Designing Products Around Customer Experience
Jake Miller founded Fellow coming out of Stanford’s d.school Launchpad course, starting with the Duo Coffee Steeper. Fellow products are now in 50 countries. In this conversation with Launchpad instructor and Adjunct Professor Perry Klebahn, Miller shares how he built a roadmap for his company, a portfolio of products, and a distribution plan by focusing on customer experience.Entrepreneu
Ellen Ochoa (NASA) - Leadership Lessons from Space
Ellen Ochoa is the first Hispanic woman astronaut to go into space, serving on four space shuttle missions. She served from 2013 to 2018 as the first Hispanic director and the second female director of Johnson Space Center. She earned her MS in electrical engineering and her PhD in electrical engineering with a focus in optical information processing from Stanford. In this conversation wi
Elizabeth Weil (Scribble Ventures) - A People-Centered Journey
Elizabeth Weil is the founder and general partner at Scribble Ventures, the seed fund where builders from OpenAI, Meta, Twitter, Instagram, and a16z channel their operator DNA into backing the next generation of AI‑native companies. In this conversation with Adjunct Lecturer Emily Ma, Weil shares the life lessons she’s learned over her career as an operator and investor, emphasizing the i
Tracy Chou (Block Party) - Founding a Mission-Driven Startup
Tracy Chou is a product-minded engineering leader and exited founder with more than 15 years of experience building and scaling consumer and enterprise products. She is best known for her work advocating for diversity and inclusion in tech, and for being founder and CEO of Block Party, a platform for online safety, privacy, and anti-harassment, which was recently acquired by DeleteMe. In
Harry Tannenbaum (Mill) - Setting the Goal at Delight
Harry Tannenbaum is the co-founder and president of Mill, a technology company combining hardware and AI to reduce waste and recover value from everyday materials, starting with food. Mill’s residential food recycler is now in tens of thousands of homes, creating the foundation for Mill Commercial, which pre-processes and analyzes food waste streams on-site, helping organizations reduce w
Kit Rodgers, Ben Jun, and Paul Kocher (Cryptography Research, Inc.) - Complementary Co-Founders in Cryptography
Stanford alumni Kit Rodgers, Paul Kocher, and Ben Jun co-founded Cryptography Research, Inc. (CRI), where they built and deployed some of the world’s most impactful security technologies. CRI was acquired by Rambus in 2011 for $342 million. Kocher is a cryptography and data security researcher best known as a co-author of the SSL 3.0/TLS 1.0 protocols. Jun is an engineer who most recently
Brendan Foody (Mercor) - Agentic Data and the Future of AI
Brendan Foody co-founded Mercor, a recruiting startup that helps Silicon Valley's top AI labs train their models to do professional-level reasoning by matching skilled workers with enterprise projects. Foody and his co-founders, Surya Midha and Adarsh Hiremath, became the world's three youngest self-made billionaires in October 2025. In this conversation with Adjunct Lecturer Emily Ma, Fo
Sergey Brin (Google & Alphabet) - Google Origins and AI Futures
Recorded live at the capstone celebration of the Stanford School of Engineering Centennial, this ETL episode features Sergey Brin, the American computer scientist and entrepreneur who co-founded Google with Larry Page and revolutionized global information access. Brin remains an active co-founder and board member of Google’s parent company, Alphabet, and he has been involved in Google’s G
Eric Volmar (Stanford University) - A New Entrepreneurship Playbook
Eric Volmar is teaching lead at the Gordian Knot Center for National Security Innovation at Stanford. His work focuses on connecting defense, academia, and entrepreneurship to accelerate innovation for national security, supporting new ventures at the intersection of technology and policy. In this presentation – followed by a conversation with Tina Seelig, executive director of Knight-Hen
Steve Cousins (Stanford University) - Real-World Robotics
Steve Cousins is the executive director of the Stanford Robotics Center and founder of Relay Robotics (formerly Savioke), which builds autonomous service robots for hotels and healthcare. Cousins’ career reflects a commitment to advancing robotics from research to real-world applications. In this presentation, he shares stories of his time in research, startups, and academia to illustrate
Jane Chen (Embrace Global) - Doing the Inner Work
Jane Chen is the co-founder of Embrace Global, which created a low-cost infant warmer that has helped more than one million babies in low-resource settings. Her new book, Like a Wave We Break: a Memoir of Falling Apart and Finding Myself, tells the story of her globe-spanning journey to break free of the narratives that once defined her and confront the long-buried truths of a traumatic p
Sanjit Biswas (Samsara) - Making a Real-World Impact
Sanjit Biswas is the co-founder and CEO of Samsara, a global leader in allowing physical operations organizations to harness data, AI, and the Internet of Things. He started the company with the mission to increase the safety, efficiency, and sustainability of the operations that power the global economy. In this presentation, Biswas tells the story of how he co-founded his first company
Drew Endy (Stanford University) - A Synthetic Biology Dream
Drew Endy is an associate professor of bioengineering at Stanford University and a pioneer of synthetic biology. A co-founder of the BioBricks Foundation, Endy helped launch the International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition to democratize biotechnology for student innovators worldwide. In this presentation, Endy gives a primer on synthetic biology and the obstacles it ha
Grant Lee (Gamma) - Finding Early-Stage Energy
Grant Lee is the CEO and Co-founder of Gamma, an AI-powered presentation and website design tool that has scaled to 50 million customers and $50 million in annual recurring revenue with fewer than 50 employees. In this conversation with Adjunct Lecturer Ravi Belani, Lee shares how his search for energizing projects and partnerships shaped Gamma’s path, and he gives advice for early-stage
Tina Seelig (Stanford University) - Catching the Winds of Luck
Tina Seelig is an educator, entrepreneur, and bestselling author who has spent decades teaching creativity, innovation, and leadership at Stanford. She is the executive director of Knight-Hennessy Scholars and director emerita of the Stanford Technology Ventures Program. In this presentation, inspired by her forthcoming book What I Wish I Knew about Luck, Seelig gives practical and encour
Samir Vasavada (Vise) - From Teenage Founder to Tech CEO
Samir Vasavada, co-founder and CEO of Vise, shares his inspiring journey from launching an AI-powered asset management startup as a teenager to raising more than $130M from top VCs like Sequoia and Founders Fund. Vasavada discusses navigating the “dark side” of venture funding, the lessons learned from hiring seasoned executives too early, and why the best leaders often come from wi
Osi Imeokparia (Kode with Klossy) - Training Tech’s Next Gen [Entire Talk]
Founded by supermodel Karlie Kloss, Kode With Klossy teaches young women and gender expansive youth how to code. The organization supports a community of 11,000 from 100-plus countries over more than a decade to ensure their education is effective. CEO Osi Imeokparia shares how long-term support and mentorship for diverse young coders can lead to success in computer science majors and car
Garrett Lord (Handshake) - The Network Effect
Garrett Lord started Handshake to make it easier for students from all backgrounds to find internships. Lord discusses his own experience studying computer science at Michigan Tech and the disparities that leave so many students without exposure to recruiters at their campuses. In democratizing the job search, Lord talks about identifying a two-way marketplace and how to scale helping one
Vinay Hiremath (LoomAI) - The Uncertainty After Success [Explicit]
Vinay Hiremath shares his entrepreneurial journey as the co-founder of LoomAI, a video messaging platform that grew to 30 million users and was acquired by Atlassian for nearly $1 billion. Vinay chronicles his entrepreneurial journey and its many pivots and adaptations – as well as his post-acquisition period of profound questioning and self-discovery. This talk includes references t
Stanley Tang (DoorDash) - Scaling the Unscalable
Stanley Tang was a junior at Stanford when he started to explore technology solutions for small businesses. Working with local shops got him thinking about food delivery, and while at first the idea didn’t seem scalable, the ingredients for DoorDash began to come together. Recounting how DoorDash’s growth spanned many ups and downs including global crises, Tang shares how resilience is bu
Bonny Simi (Jet Blue & Joby Aviation) - An Entrepreneurial Mindset—Applied to You [ETL Looks Back]
In this 2016 conversation, Bonny Simi—Olympian, airline pilot, venture capitalist, and entrepreneur—explains how success is built on curiosity, creativity, and the courage to take risks. While in her role with JetBlue, Simi shared how setting bold intentions, building transferable skills, and leveraging parallel career moves shaped her unconventional career. Her insights aren’t just for e
Payal Kadakia (ClassPass) - Bringing Your Whole Self to Your Venture [ETL Looks Back]
Payal Kadakia's 2022 conversation feels as relevant as ever, highlighting the enduring importance of authenticity in strong leadership. In this episode, the founder of ClassPass and the Sa Dance Company shares how integrating her full identity—as both a dancer and a business leader—was crucial to her success. Kadakia discusses the importance of listening to your calling, making values-dri
Justin Kan (Twitch) - Finding Fulfillment in Entrepreneurship [ETL Looks Back]
Justin Kan is an entrepreneur and investor best known as the co-founder of Twitch. In this conversation from 2021, Kan shares candid insights on the highs and lows of entrepreneurship, emphasizing the importance of resilience, self-awareness, and personal well-being. Reflecting on his journey—from founding Twitch to reassessing his motivations—he discusses the challenges of chasing extern
Astro Teller (Alphabet’s X) - Celebrating Failure Fuels Moonshots [ETL Looks Back]
In this compelling talk from 2016, Astro Teller, director of Alphabet’s moonshot factory, X, explores how embracing failure fuels groundbreaking innovation. He shares how a culture that rewards audacity and transparency can systematically drive progress, turning ambitious ideas into reality. Teller discusses the importance of pre-mortems, rewarding teams for shutting down projects, and cr
Sarah Friar (Nextdoor) - Building Better Online Communities [ETL Looks Back]
In December 2018, Sarah Jane Friar became CEO of Nextdoor, the world’s largest private social network for neighborhoods. In her conversation with Stanford professor Tom Byers, she discussed her passion for fostering a sense of community amid the challenges of misinformation and social disconnection. Friar highlighted that Nextdoor uniquely leverages the power of proximity, allowing neighb
Aicha Evans (Zoox) - Driving Innovation [ETL Looks Back]
As autonomous vehicles continue to evolve, we’re revisiting our 2021 conversation with Aicha Evans, CEO of Zoox. At the time, Zoox had recently been acquired by Amazon, and Evans was leading the charge in developing fully autonomous, purpose-built robotaxis. In this discussion with Stanford adjunct lecturer and former Zoox board member Heidi Roizen, Evans shares insights on innovation in
Debbie Sterling (GoldieBlox) - Disrupting the Pink Aisle [ETL Looks Back]
Much has shifted in the landscape of gender representation in STEM fields, with women making gains in recent decades. There is an increased interest among girls in pursuing STEM fields, and a growing awareness of how to support them as men continue to make up a majority of the field. Debbie Sterling, founder and CEO of GoldieBlox, exemplifies this evolution with her inspiring journey from
Alberto Savoia (Google) - Build the Right It [ETL Looks Back]
Revisit timeless insights from Alberto Savoia, Google’s first engineering director and the driving force behind the launch of AdWords, in this re-released 2019 ETL episode. As the creator of “pretotyping” and author of The Right It, Savoia tackles one of innovation’s greatest challenges: ensuring you’re building a product the market truly wants. With 80% of innovations failing—even when e
Josh Wolfe (Lux Capital) - Investing at the Cutting Edge [ETL Looks Back]
For the winter 2025 installment of ETL Looks Back, we asked the team at the Stanford Technology Ventures Program to recommend some of their favorite ETL episodes from the past. Our first pick comes from Ravi Belani and features Josh Wolfe, co-founder of Lux Capital, which funds scientists and entrepreneurs who pursue counter-conventional solutions to the most vexing problems of our time.
Returning With Real-World Wisdom [ETL Looks Back]
How do graduates of the Stanford Technology Ventures Program’s entrepreneurship fellows programs apply their skills in the real world? STVP’s Tina Seelig spoke with four alumni about how they have used their academic experiences to address some of the world's most challenging problems. In this episode:Etosha Cave, Opus 12Jonah Greenberger, Bright, Inc.Cody Karutz, STRIVR Labs, Inc.Elaine
Clara Shih - What No One Tells You About Entrepreneurship [ETL Looks Back]
Clara Shih is the CEO of Salesforce AI and has received recognition as one of Fortune’s Most Powerful Women Entrepreneurs and TIME’s Most Influential People in AI. In this episode, she emphasizes the importance of maintaining pre-existing friendships for mental health and support during her entrepreneurial journey at Hearsay Systems, particularly when her time for developing new relations
Maria Barrera (Clayful) - Mental Health for Entrepreneurs [ETL Looks Back]
As an entrepreneur in education, Maria Barrera, founder of Clayful, started to apply her training as a mechanical engineer to thinking about mental health and the challenges young people were facing in schools post-pandemic. In true Stanford d.school fashion, Barrera says she went into a lot of need-finding, talking to everyone she could, finding “aha” moments that would help shape her co
Gabriel Parisi-Amon (Nebia Shower) - A Burnout Manifesto [ETL Looks Back]
Burnout is familiar to all entrepreneurs and takes its toll. Gabriel Parisi-Amon, founder of Nebia, which was acquired by Brondell, takes on the “perfect founder” myth and asks us to reconsider the system that inevitably leads to burnout. Parisi-Amon offers practical advice on priorities and perspectives for founders at any stage. Through examples from his own experience as a founder, he
Andy Dunn (Bonobos) - Mental Health for Entrepreneurs [ETL Looks Back]
Andy Dunn, founder of the menswear line Bonobos, speaks frankly about his own struggles with bipolar disorder and how his mental illness didn’t define him but rather helped him innovate and become the creative founder his company needed. He challenges the field to transform the stigma attached to mental illness to better recognize the strengths of those who are living with one—the creativ
Richard Miller (Olin College) - More Innovation Through Education [ETL Looks Back]
Richard Miller was credited with reimagining undergraduate engineering education at Olin College, where he was the founding director. Miller challenged us to consider who we teach, what we teach, and how that teaching reaches students. He spoke about shifting the focus from showing up in class to learn, to learning 24/7; from learning in isolation to learning as part of a community; and t
Jennifer Carolan (Reach Capital) - Seeking the Full Potential of Education [ETL Looks Back]
Jennifer Carolan is Co-Founder and Partner at Reach Capital. In 2014, while with the NewSchools Venture Fund, Carolan spoke with Steve Blank about the emergence of EdTech products – before technology was widely used in classrooms and many students had access to their own devices. Pulling from her experience as a science teacher, Carolan shared insights on how we can incorporate the ventur
Sal Khan (Khan Academy) - Education Reimagined [ETL Looks Back]
While the Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders speaker series is on pause, we’re excited to bring you ETL Looks Back, a series of timely gems from our archives. We’re kicking off the school year with some talks on education, starting with Sal Khan, Founder and CEO of the world-renowned Khan Academy. When he visited ETL in 2014, Khan offered a blueprint for individualized, technology-enhanced l
Announcing ETL Looks Back
The ETL series is currently taking a break, but don’t worry! We’ll keep your podcast feed flowing with a special ETL Looks Back series, highlighting some timely gems from our archives. They’ll be published right here in your regular ETL feed—there’s nothing you need to do. Be sure to stay subscribed for future announcements about the return of the series. We can't wait to bring you more n
Alexandra Zatarain (Eight Sleep) - Getting to Product-Market Fit
Alexandra Zatarain is the co-founder and VP of brand and marketing of Eight Sleep, the world’s first sleep fitness company. A marketer and brand-builder, Zatarain has built the Eight Sleep brand and scaled the company’s revenue from $0 to current state. Eight Sleep was named one of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies of 2018 and was recognized two years in a row as a TIME Best Invent
Maria Barrera (Clayful) - Mental Health Tech, Mentally Healthy Startups
Maria Barrera, a Stanford-educated engineer, is the founder and CEO of Clayful, a platform dedicated to providing essential mental health support for the TikTok generation. Today, Barrera’s company creates accessible resources for K-12 students and has already made a profound impact on thousands of students nationwide. In this conversation with Stanford adjunct lecturer Ravi Belani, Barre
David Allemann (On) - Exploration in Sports Technology
David Allemann co-leads the Swiss sports company On, one of the fastest-growing global sports brands. He puts a special focus on product, design, marketing, and the direct-to-consumer business of On. Previously, Allemann worked at the intersection of business and creativity at McKinsey & Company, as managing director of the advertising agency Young & Rubicam, and as CMO of design
Ali Ghodsi (Databricks) - Lessons from a Large Founding Team
Ali Ghodsi is the CEO and co-founder of Databricks, a leader in data and AI. He pioneered the data intelligence platform built on a lakehouse architecture, revolutionizing analytics and AI for global organizations. Prior to becoming CEO, he served as the VP of engineering and product management. In this conversation with Stanford adjunct lecturer Ravi Belani, Ghodsi Shares lessons he’s le
Margo Georgiadis (Flagship Pioneering and Montai Health) - Deep Tech Innovation
Margo Georgiadis is a CEO-partner at Flagship Pioneering and co-founder and CEO of Montai Health, an AI platform company enabling the predictable discovery of breakthrough small molecule medicines to treat and preempt chronic disease. In these roles, Georgiadis brings extensive expertise in technological innovation and high-performance business transformation and leverages her artificial
Sam Altman (OpenAI) - The Possibilities of AI
Sam Altman is the co-founder and CEO of OpenAI, the AI research and deployment company behind ChatGPT and DALL-E. Altman was president of the early-stage startup accelerator Y Combinator from 2014 to 2019. In 2015, he co-founded OpenAI as a nonprofit research lab with the mission to build general-purpose artificial intelligence that benefits all humanity. In this conversation with Stanfor
Qasar Younis (Applied Intuition) - Radically Pragmatic Insights
Qasar Younis is the co-founder and CEO of Applied Intuition, which creates software solutions to help automakers, Tier 1 suppliers, and companies in the trucking, construction, and agriculture industries transition to next-generation vehicles. Before founding Applied Intuition, Younis was a partner and COO of Y Combinator. In this conversation with Stanford adjunct lecturer Ravi Belani, Y
Sharon Prince (Grace Farms Foundation) - Designing From Values
Sharon Prince is the CEO and founder of Grace Farms Foundation, a new kind of boundary-defying public space in New Canaan, Connecticut, that has become widely known as a global humanitarian and cultural center. Grace Farms is the platform for the Foundation and its interdisciplinary humanitarian mission to pursue peace through nature, arts, justice, community, faith, and Design for Freedo
Sophia Edelstein and Nathan Kondamuri (Pair Eyewear) - From Stanford Students to Co-CEOs
Sophia Edelstein and Nathan Kondamuri are co-founders and co-CEOs of Pair Eyewear. Since its inception, Pair Eyewear has put consumers at the center of the innovation process, ensuring that the brand is at the forefront of redefining the eyewear experience by offering continual customizability, freedom of choice, and affordability for glasses. In this conversation with Stanford adjunct le
Clara Shih (Salesforce AI) - What No One Tells You About Entrepreneurship
Clara Shih is CEO of Salesforce AI, the world’s most trusted enterprise AI for customer relationship management. A digital pioneer, Shih has been named one of Fortune’s Most Powerful Women Entrepreneurs, TIME’s Most Influential People in AI, and the World Economic Forum’s Young Global Leaders. She is a member of the Starbucks board of directors and serves as executive chair of Hearsay Sys
Shiza Shahid (Our Place) - A Meaningful Entrepreneurial Path
Shiza Shahid is the co-founder and co-CEO of Our Place, a mission-driven startup reimagining kitchenware for the modern, multiethnic, global kitchen. Prior to Our Place, Shahid also co-founded the Malala Fund with Nobel Prize winner Malala Yousafzai. She led the organization as founding CEO, advocating for the rights of all girls to attend school. Shahid also launched NOW Ventures, an ang
Daniela Amodei (Anthropic) - ‘Helpful, Honest, Harmless’ AI
Daniela Amodei is president and co-founder of Anthropic, an AI safety and research company. Amodei manages the senior leadership team, leveraging her people and management experience to further the company’s goal of building reliable, interpretable, and steerable AI systems. In this conversation with Stanford adjunct lecturer Emily Ma, Amodei talks about how Anthropic’s team of co-founder
Ernestine Fu (Brave Capital) - Taking Action for Startup Success
Ernestine Fu is managing general partner of venture capital firm Brave Capital. Over the past decade, Fu has worked across the startup ecosystem, including negotiating merger and acquisition agreements, organizing SPVs for later-stage companies, angel investing in and advising companies that have since been acquired, and advising banks on venture debt. Alongside her role at Brave Capital,
Bonus: ETL’s Emily Ma on Move Fast and Fix the Planet
ETL is off this week, but in its place, we’re pleased to share the first episode of a new podcast from Stanford eCorner and STVP called Move Fast and Fix the Planet. It’s about climate and sustainability entrepreneurship, and this episode features ETL host Emily Ma, head of special projects in sustainability, real estate, and workplace services at Google. Delve into Emily's journey as an
Bob Sutton and Huggy Rao (Stanford) - Smart Leaders Understand Friction [EXPLICIT]
Robert I. Sutton is an organizational psychologist and professor emeritus of Management Science and Engineering in the Stanford School of Engineering. Hayagreeva “Huggy” Rao is the Atholl McBean Professor of Organizational Behavior at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and a fellow of the Center for Advanced Study in Behavioral Science, the Sociological Research Association, and the
Adrian Rodriguez (Dreamlinks) - A Visually Impaired Founder’s Journey
Adrian Rodriguez is the co-founder and CEO of Dreamlinks, a startup developing AI-powered building blocks that make creating virtual 3D worlds as fun as playing with LEGO bricks. Prior to founding Dreamlinks, Rodriguez taught game design at StreetCode Academy, created a web design course for blind programmers, and worked as the CTO of AMPAworks, a company that uses computer vision to auto
Jessica Jackley (Kiva and Untapped Capital) - ‘What If?’ Changes the World
Jessica Jackley is an entrepreneur and investor best known as the founder of Kiva, the first microfinance crowdfunding platform, with $2 billion in loans since 2005. She is currently a founder and general partner at Untapped Capital, an early-stage venture capital firm championing unexpected founders. In this presentation, Jackley shares her journey to becoming a mission-focused entrepren
Sarah Lamaison (Dioxycle) - Climate Tech Insights
Sarah Lamaison is the co-founder and CEO of Dioxycle, which is pioneering sustainable chemistry by building breakthrough technologies that convert industrial carbon emissions into everyday chemicals with unprecedented energy and cost efficiency. In this presentation, Lamaison explains how her company fits into the future of carbon-capture technology, then shares advice for tech founders —
Michelle Lee (Medra) - From Conviction to Company
Michelle Lee is the founder and CEO of Medra, which combines recent advances in robotics and computer vision to build lab automation technology. She has previously worked at NVIDIA, SpaceX, and McKinsey. Prior to founding Medra, Lee was an assistant professor in computer science and electrical computer engineering at New York University. In this presentation and conversation with Stanford
Andy Dunn (Bonobos) - Mental Health for Entrepreneurs
Andy Dunn is an entrepreneur, author, and investor. Dunn co-founded the menswear e-commerce brand Bonobos in 2007 and served as the company’s CEO for its first 10 years, pioneering the digitally native brand movement. In 2022, Dunn published a memoir lifting the veil on the mental health demons he’d been privately battling as he built Bonobos. “Burn Rate: Launching a Startup and Losing My
Kathleen Eisenhardt (Stanford) - Strategy for New Companies
Kathleen Eisenhardt is the Stanford W. Ascherman M.D. Professor in the Stanford School of Engineering. She is also a faculty member with STVP, the Stanford Engineering Entrepreneurship Center, and the Stanford Digital Economy Lab. Among the most widely cited entrepreneurship scholars in the world, Eisenhardt is the author of over 100 articles and several books, most recently (with Don Sul
Andrew Ng (AI Fund) - The Near Future of AI
Andrew Ng is the managing general partner at AI Fund, a startup studio building new AI companies from the ground up; the founder of DeepLearning.AI; and an adjunct professor of computer science at Stanford University. In this presentation and conversation with Stanford adjunct lecturer Ravi Belani, Ng talks about upcoming opportunities for entrepreneurs exploring AI technology and address
Garry Tan (Y Combinator) - Unconventional Advice for Founders
Garry Tan is president and CEO of Y Combinator, which funds hundreds of companies per year through a web-based application. Tan is also the co-founder, board partner and advisor of Initialized Capital, an early stage venture capital fund, and co-founded Posterous, a blog platform acquired by Twitter. In this presentation, Tan shares advice and insights for aspiring entrepreneurs and start
Cody Coleman (Coactive AI) - Starting from ‘Why’
Cody Coleman is the co-founder and CEO of Coactive AI, an analytics platform for visual content. Coactive AI leverages artificial intelligence to make it easy for enterprise companies to search, filter, and analyze large amounts of image and video data by bringing structure to unstructured data. In this presentation, Coleman shares how his life story has shaped the type of entrepren
Josh Wolfe (Lux Capital) - Investing at the Cutting Edge
Josh Wolfe co-founded Lux Capital to support scientists and entrepreneurs who pursue counter-conventional solutions to the most vexing puzzles of our time in order to lead us into a brighter future. The more ambitious the project, the better—like, say, creating matter from light. Wolfe is a director at Shapeways, Strateos, Lux Research, Kallyope, CTRL-labs, Variant, and Varda, and helped
Rahul Roy-Chowdhury (Grammarly) - Responsible AI Innovation
Rahul Roy-Chowdhury is Grammarly’s CEO as of May 1, 2023. He was previously the company’s Global Head of Product, overseeing everything that makes the company’s writing assistance software tick, managing the product, design, and data science teams. Before coming aboard at Grammarly, Roy-Chowdhury spent many years at Google leading the Privacy, Safety, and Security teams to unified solutio
Claire Hughes Johnson (Stripe) - Scaling Operations and People
Claire Hughes Johnson is a corporate officer and advisor for Stripe, a global technology company that builds economic infrastructure for the internet. From 2014 to 2021, Claire served as Stripe’s Chief Operating Officer, responsible for scaling the company’s worldwide operations to meet the needs of its rapidly growing user base. During her tenure as COO, Stripe grew from less than 200 em
Julia Collins (Planet FWD) - Opportunities in Climate Tech
Julia Collins is the founder and CEO of Planet FWD, which is empowering the next generation of sustainable consumer companies with its climate management platform. Planet FWD is focused on decarbonizing global supply chains with the belief that all organizations can achieve Net Zero. The platform is inspired by Planet FWD’s own snack brand, Moonshot, which launched in 2020 as the first cl
Ben Collier and James Kanoff (The Farmlink Project) - Students Solving Hunger
Ben Collier and James Kanoff are two co-founders of The Farmlink Project, a student-led movement that has provided over 100 million pounds of nutritious food to communities facing hunger in the United States. They started the project out of their college dorm rooms at Brown and Stanford University during the pandemic by renting a U-Haul truck to connect farmers with surplus to their local
Frederic Kerrest (Okta) - The Truth about Entrepreneurship
Frederic Kerrest is the executive vice chairman and co-founder of Okta. He is responsible for Okta's day-to-day operations, working with employees, partners, and customers to deliver on the company's vision of enabling any organization to use any technology. Kerrest is the author of “Zero to IPO,” a WSJ Bestseller guidebook to building startups featuring insights from some of the world’s
Ilya Sutskever (OpenAI) - Inside OpenAI
Ilya Sutskever is the co-founder and chief scientist of OpenAI, which aims to build artificial general intelligence that benefits all of humanity. He leads research at OpenAI and is one of the architects behind the GPT models. In this conversation with Stanford adjunct lecturer Ravi Belani, Sutskever explains his approach to making complex decisions at OpenAI and for AI companies in gener
Deb Liu (Ancestry) - The Power of Scrappiness
Deb Liu is the CEO of Ancestry. With over 19 years in the tech industry, she has been named one of Business Insider’s most powerful female engineers and one of PaymentsSource’s most influential women in payments. She was previously a senior executive at Facebook, where she created and led Facebook Marketplace. Her book, “Take Back Your Power: 10 New Roles for Women at Work,” was published
Karabo Morule (Capital Art) - African Art Activism through Fintech
Karabo Morule is the founder of Capital Art, which is an art fintech and the first art collection management service that is focused on collectors of modern and contemporary African art. Morule is also a non-executive director at TymeBank, South Africa’s first bank to have its core banking system in the cloud. In this conversation with Stanford adjunct lecturer Vimbayi Kajese, Morule disc
Connie Chan (Andreessen Horowitz) - Career Advice from a VC Pro
Connie Chan is a general partner at Andreessen Horowitz, a Silicon Valley-based technology venture capital firm with $35B in assets under management across multiple funds, where she focuses on investing in consumer technology. Chan joined the firm in 2011 as a deal partner on the investment team before becoming a general partner in 2018. She serves on the boards of Cider, Whatnot, and KoB
Austin Russell (Luminar) - Behind the Scenes of a Mega-Unicorn
Austin Russell is the founder and CEO of Luminar, the 27 year old global leader in automotive lidar hardware and software technology. Under Russell’s leadership, Luminar has developed the first lidar and software technology capable of power producing autonomous vehicles, has amassed over 50 commercial partners including the majority of the world’s largest automakers, and went public on th
Emmy Sobieski (Competitive Storytelling, Inc.) - Build Wealth with Personal Skills
Emmy Sobieski, CFA, is the chief operating officer of Competitive Storytelling, Inc., which helps venture-backed founders from seed and beyond tell their story through methods such as the Founder Fundraising Program. Sobieski is also the author of the book $100M Careers: The 5 Fastest Paths to Wealth Beyond Your Wildest Dreams, released in December 2022. In this conversation with Mo-Yun L
Nikil Viswanathan (Alchemy) - Lessons from a Stanford Success
Nikil Viswanathan is the co-founder and CEO of Alchemy, the world's leading web3 developer platform. Alchemy is hailed as the fastest growing company in history, going from public launch to a $10 billion valuation in just 16 months. Alchemy powers over $100 billion in transactions globally, including the majority of the NFT industry, top web3 companies, and traditional enterprises. In thi
Dave Vasen (brightwheel) - Problem-Solving for a Unique Market
Dave Vasen is the founder and CEO of brightwheel, the leading subscription software platform for early education. In April 2016, Vasen appeared on ABC’s “Shark Tank” and secured a $600,000 investment at one of the highest all-time valuations for the TV show. In this conversation with Stanford lecturer Emily Ma, Vasen shares his experience creating a software solution customized to fit the
Annie Hockey (Column) - Reimagining Fintech
Annie Hockey is the co-CEO of Column, a nationally chartered bank that publicly launched in 2022 for developers who are building modern financial products and services. Hockey leads, among other functions, the regulatory, legal, accounting, and human resources aspects of Column. In this conversation with Stanford lecturer Emily Ma, Hockey discusses how she and her co-founder/co-CEO have n
Elise Densborn (Splendid Spoon) - From Customer to Co-CEO
Elise Densborn is the co-CEO of Splendid Spoon, a direct-to-consumer meal delivery platform that offers ready-to-eat, plant-based meals. Densborn was first introduced to Splendid Spoon as a customer. After over a decade in the finance industry, she joined the Splendid Spoon team as a consultant in 2018 and quickly rose through the ranks in permanent roles as VP of finance and insights and
Dante Disparte (Circle) - Ethical Crypto Innovation
Dante Disparte is chief strategy officer and head of global policy at Circle, a global financial technology firm at the center of digital currency innovation and open financial infrastructure. He is responsible for overseeing the company strategy, communications, policy and public affairs. In this conversation with Stanford adjunct lecturer Ravi Belani, Disparte discusses important lesson
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