Innovation & Policy with Sami Mahroum
Discovering ‘Barcelona’ with Alfred Bosch
Learning how to code with Jacobo Vilella
Investing and Community with Susan Akbapour and Faraj Aalaei
Investing and Community with Susan Akbapour and Faraj Aalaei
Last week, Katrina Logie interviewed two great minds, Susan and Faraj, at a Fireside Chat hosted for guests of the Sir Victor Hotel, powered by Harbour.Space University.
Susan Akbapour and Faraj Aalaei both moved to the US from Iran. Faraj came at 17 years old, Susan came a few years later after receiving her Bachelor’s in Bio. They met years later in the US, while Susan was a journalist at a magazine that interviewed Faraj about his work in Tech. From there, they fell in love, had a beautiful daughter together, worked hard at their careers and founded Candou, an early stage fund since 2016 to support tech startups.
Candou, in Farsi, means beehive, and like bees, teamwork is important to Susan and Faraj. The pair walk us through their experiences working together. They describe their investment work like being grandparents. They have had their time “changing diapers” as CEOs and founders of tech companies (Susan founded Mavatar and Faraj was CEO at Aquantia). As investors, they are able to do the fun things, like help others achieve their goals instead of being in the nitty gritty of starting their own businesses.
When asked how they function as a team, Susan joked that “she does all the work” and Faraj fervently agreed! In all seriousness, Susan explains that she focuses on the small details while Faraj comes up with the big ideas, they find ways to collaborate with their different skill sets. The pair acknowledge that they have different experiences and have different skills to bring to the table. They choose to invest in things they know they have experience with, like AI and blockchain, and companies that align with their own ideas, passions and mission statements.
Apart from their work together at Candou, inspiring young minds to pursue their businesses, Susan works with an organization called Mothers in Poverty and with How Women Lead and together, they started the Akbapour Aalaei Fellowship Fund to provide financial support to students at Stanford Graduate School of Business.
They describe to us the importance of being involved in your community. Even if you aren’t able to contribute financially, play any part that you can in your community. Susan tells us that “It doesn’t matter what you can do, just do it.” So what are you doing to help your community?
Find more stories from people like Susan and Faraj on Katrina Logie’s podcast, ‘See you tomorrow’, with Harbour.Space University or check out her website to stay up-to-date on upcoming events!
Ann Hiatt: Passionate, Mission Driven, Purposeful
Ann Hiatt: Passionate, Mission Driven Purposeful
Maximize every moment and create a life of achievement, adventure and authenticity.
This is how Ann Hiatt lives her life. Ann Hiatt is founder and CEO of her leadership strategist and consultant firm. Her previous experience includes 15 years as Executive Business Partner for Jeff Bezos, Founder and previous CEO of Amazon, and Executive Business Partner and Chief of Staff to Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google.
She started with Amazon at age 22, right after graduating from University of Washington with a Bachelors in International Studies. At that time, Amazon was not yet the corporate powerhouse that we see it as today but it was growing, influenced by the bright minds that were the foundation of the company. Ann described loving being surrounded by these bright minds, something she still enjoys today. She felt inspired and amazed to know that she was, and still is, surrounded by some of the greatest minds in the world.
But, at the same time, she didn’t always feel like she had the authority and experience to be there. Instead of stewing in that feeling, she did something about it. She noticed that every morning, Jeff Bezos would walk into work with three different newspapers tucked under his arm, so as soon as he finished his reading, she would read them too. She gave herself assignments to do after her day’s work was done, teaching herself the topics she didn’t understand. She earned her place among these great minds and built up her confidence.
Two years ago, she went into business for herself as a private consultant. Ann Hiatt could easily be working for any corporation she wanted but she decided to pursue her own path. She realized that she wanted to inspire others to accomplish their goals, to lend support and be a voice for an underrepresented group of entrepreneurs, and to choose clients that try to have a positive impact on the world.
Outside of her consultancy, she is teaching a course called “The Secrets to Success in Silicon Valley” where she walks her students through her own successes and also brings in different guest speakers to advise them as well! Find more information about her course here!
If you take a look at Ann Hiatt’s website, you will see that she has a bucket list. On this bucket list, she includes coming a best-selling author (check out her new book here!) and giving a TED Talk that becomes a Netflix Special. So we asked her,”what’s next?”. She said her next big thing on her bucket list is to take a vacation, which I’m sure we can all relate to!;) Looking forward to seeing the big steps Ann will take next!
To find more stories from people like Ann Hiatt, check out Katrina Logie’s podcast, ‘See you tomorrow’, with Harbour.Space University or check out her website to stay up-to-date on upcoming events!
6 Things You Need to Know About the Future of Travel!
Covid 19. Bet you’ve never heard of that one before!
Covid has changed everything, the way we work, the way we exercise, the way we shop and even the way we travel. Travel has been restricted for a while now, with travel decreasing from 4.5 billion people in 2019 to 1.8 billion people in 2020. Recently, things have started to open back up and tourism is on the rise again. However, the way travel has existed before is starting to change, from safety precautions, to new technologies to even the prospects of space travel!
How, you ask? Well, let’s take a look.
Vaccine Passports
Although not an entirely new concept, as countries like Uganda, Cameroon and many others require proof of yellow fever and other vaccines, it is becoming more and more common to require vaccination passports. Most countries are requiring people to be vaccinated and show proof of their vaccines with a CDC vaccination card before entering their borders. In response to this, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) has initiated the IATA Travel Pass which informs travelers on which tests and vaccines they need to travel and can allow them to share their results with airlines to make travel easier. (This pass is still in the trial phase, so, for the time being, only participating airlines can validate the travel pass!).
Virtual Reality
Since the Covid lockdown began, we’ve all been restless to do something, to see something, to travel. Although travel is starting to open up now, there was a time in which none of us was able to leave are homes, and even now, for those at risk, it is still dangerous to leave. With VR, we are able to hike the Andes, see the Roman Baths, experience the Louvre and maybe even swim with the sharks, all from the comfort of our own homes! Virtual reality allows us these experiences without the risk of Covid exposure.
Internet of Things (IoT)
As big changes are being made in the technology of travel, the Internet of Things is changing the tech we use on a regular basis to make our travel experiences much easier. From apps to help plan trips to pass to sense and track suitcases, to tolls and ticketing, to even the IATA Travel Pass, everything is moving to be technologically based to make travel much simpler!
Commuting
Travel on a daily basis due to the pandemic as well. Since the lockdown, we all had to transition everything, from work to school, to an online platform. And at first, it was hard since we didn’t have much opportunity to leave our homes but it did have a pretty good impact on the environment. There were no more daily commutes for most people which not only lessens the Carbon footprint, it also gives you the extra hour and half you would spend crawling through traffic on your way to work. Even now that restrictions are opening up, people are choosing to continue to work from home and no longer commute.
Civilian Space Travel
On July 20th, 2021, Jeff Bezos boarded Blue Orgin’s New Sheperd rocket and took flight into space along with his brother, Mark, and the both the oldest and the youngest people to go to space. July 11th, Richard Branson fulfilled many people’s lifelong dreams and made a trip into space as well. Civilian space travel is becoming more and more realistic for the future. Axiom Space is hoping to create the first private space station where space tourists can reside for multiple days and many other space programs are following suit in allowing for space tourism. Maybe someday soon, we’ll all be eating continental breakfast up in space together!
Hyperloop Pods
What most people don’t know about Richard Branson’s trip to space was that it was a publicity stunt for the high-speed pods he is creating with his travel focused company, The Virgin Group. Each pod will be able to hold up to 28 people and will run at up to 621 mph! Branson is hoping to have these pods open for commercial travel by 2030. Other companies, such as Hardt Hyperloop, based in the Netherlands, are also working to create hyper-loops as well. As more and more research emerges on the topic of hyper-loops, hopefully travel will be able to be much more time efficient and sustainable in the future!
Mathematics and Algorithms with Marcelo Fornet
Marcelo teaches the “Mathematical Foundations of Algorithms” class at Harbour.Space University in the Computer Science programme. He is an expert in algorithms and data structures and he shows those skills off in his job as a Software Engineer at NEAR Protocol.
The Art and Science of Selling with Olaf Knijn
Olaf teaches the “Sales-as-a-Science” class at Harbour.Space University in the High-Tech Entrepreneurship programme. He has decades of experience in B2B sales under his belt and is currently the Sales Strategy & Enablement Lead at HERE Technologies.
Going from Idea to Product with Andrey Kostyuk
Andrey teaches the “Idea to Product” class at Harbour.Space University in the High-Tech Entrepreneurship programme. He is the co-founder of venture capital firm and business accelerator AAlchemy Ventures Limited.
Experiencing Brands with Diego Marini
Diego Marini, Creative Director and Founder at Yummy Colors, joins a conversation with Katrina Logie about Italy, where he is from, freelancing and the agency world in fashion and design, and how he teaches students to design brand experiences at Harbour.Space.