Harker families, students and alums visited the Rothschild Performing Arts Center on Sept. 19 for the Venture Investment Initiative Strategic Ecosystem Gathering. During the event, guests learned more about Harker’s Venture Investment Initiative, which is funded by the Mehta Scholar Program and facilitates the funding of alumni-founded companies by giving Mehta Scholars the opportunity to create an analysis of a company of their choosing, which is later vetted by an investment committee of venture capitalists. Attendees also learned about the Strategic Ecosystem, which connects Harker’s expansive community of investors, entrepreneurs and technology and business professionals.
This year’s Mehta Scholars, seniors Tanvi Shivakumar and Leana Zhou, announced that they would be supporting Tivara, co-founded by Aumesh Misra ’16. “Tivara’s goal is to help doctors deliver care to patients faster. They’re first doing this through automating prior authorization,” said Shivakumar. She further explained that this will expedite the process of detailing to insurance companies why a treatment or procedure is necessary, “and by automating this, [Tivara] is trying to send those requests much faster and get approvals much quicker, so patients can have care faster.”
Student founders also appeared at the event to promote their companies and present to the audience. Junior Siddhartha Daswani shared his vision for Smoke Signal, a company that uses artificial intelligence to more effectively detect and fight wildfires. ClosetCycle, founded by senior Sophie Pellet and Sammie Liu, is an app that allows users to buy and sell secondhand clothing, reducing waste bypassing the inconveniences of thrifting. Hoping to improve the health of K-5 students, junior Cam Krause founded Health Heroes, which creates specialized health education packages containing lesson plans, activities and videos. Finally, junior Ava Zarkesh introduced Research Hive, an AI-based research tool that searches for and cites academic sources, providing an alternative to other AI services that often return broken links or treat all sources equally.
Alums such as Deeya Viradia ’23 took the opportunity to meet and network. “I’m really excited to meet with some of the other alumni of Berkeley as well as the current students,” said Viradia, who is co-founder of quant², a company specializing in algorithms for financial modeling. “I think Harker just has such a great network, and I think being able to meet people who have graduated before me and also inspire the current Harker students here will be amazing.”
Om Tandon ’24, now at USC studying computer engineering, flew in from Los Angeles for the event. “I’ve worked in startups before and kind of wanted to make the pivot into VC or growth equity,” he said. “I thought it would be a great opportunity for me to talk to people, talk to investors and understand what they’re looking for when they’re hiring.”
Other speakers at the event included Jason Huang ’96 of electronics manufacturer Sentec Group, who was an investment advisor to 2024-25 Mehta Scholars Saahira Dayal ‘25 Andy Chung ’25. Huang spoke briefly about his time at Harker and his work with the Mehta Scholar Program. Barret Glasauer ’09 of Rejigg also appeared to briefly discuss his experience of working with Mehta Scholar Ian Gerstner ’25. “It felt pretty odd pitching an 18-year-old on my startup, but I think he carried himself extremely well,” Gerstner said.
The event concluded with fireside chats with Rahul Madduluri ’12 of Doppel, which uses AI to combat the influence of malicious advertising and fake online profiles, and Ethan Agarwal ’03, co-founder of Aaptiv and financial services company The Coterie, who took questions about their experiences as entrepreneurs and advice they have for young founders.