BASES 2019-2020: A Year in Review

 
 
 

Javelin VP and adaptations to COVID-19: how work will change and startups can be resilient

Our Sponsors June 29, 2020

Alex Gurevich from Javelin VP discussed their portfolio companies’ different responses to coronavirus, building resiliency in startups, and long-term impacts to how people work. Javelin VP, one of BASES’ sponsors, is a San Francisco-based venture capital fund, with investments from health to tech to education, such as online platform Masterclass.

How has Javelin VP had to adapt to the changes because of COVID-19?

It was sort of a gradual thing for us. Over a couple of weeks, we heard some more companies were starting to think about working from home before the state orders. So, we kind of knew a few weeks in advance before shelter in place started.

The first thing that we did is to just take stock of what's going on. We sat down and did a whole portfolio review, where we look through pretty much every single one of our portfolio companies to understand how they are being impacted today by shelter in place and COVID, and also what could happen down the road to these companies. And then [we] try to figure out what we can do as good partners to help them navigate through these periods.

Interestingly enough, we found out that we have more companies than I thought that were actually benefitting from “Shelter-in-Place.” That's related to the fact that you're seeing this massive acceleration of technology adoption cycles as people have no choice but try new products and services. People are at home, and they're trying new things, whether it's content or media software, productivity software, [or] digital health. All these trends were already happening, but they were happening [at] a slower pace. A trend that was maybe five to ten years out from really taking hold got quickly accelerated.

Of course, we also have several companies that were hit very hard by the pandemic—especially companies that have anything to do with interacting in the physical world. Their activity levels really plummeted. Heartbreaking to see that, especially if those companies had no choice but to lay employees off.

I would say our responses amongst our portfolio was really threefold. For the companies that were doing well, we were actually helping them to think about how to be more aggressive during this time. If you are fortunate enough to be in a position of strength when everyone else is retreating, you have to recognize the opportunity and seize the moment. If you're in a position where there's demand for what you do, you should be going [on the] offensive, not defensive. You still want to be very cautious and measured in how you do it, but you want to step on the gas a bit. Your marketing costs might be cheaper. It might be easier for you to access great talent. Seize your moment, take advantage, and act with conviction and strength. This is a chance to really accelerate much faster than ever before.

The second type of response, if your company has been adversely affected by the pandemic, is to cut costs and preserve runway. You have to survive. During this period, raise money if you can. If you can't, then trim expenses. Be nimble when it comes to your business model. Adapt it if you can so that you experience tailwinds versus headwinds (i.e. more online, less offline) The most important thing though is to survive. If you do that, then on the tail end, when a recovery happens, you're going to be in a much better position, probably with a lot less competition. You're going to have a lower cost structure, better habits as a company, and a stronger business model. And when the recovery happens, you may be able to accelerate growth much faster than in pre-COVID times. That’s the hope anyway.

The third point is, stock pile cheap assets for the recovery. Figure out what you need for that recovery. That will help you accelerate when a recovery does happen. As an example, advertising rates have dropped, so some companies could actually spend a little bit more money to acquire customers who may not be as profitable for them today. But in a recovery scenario, those customers will increase their spending and your growth will rebound that much faster.

For the companies that aren't doing too well, what are some ways to help them survive and get back on their feet?

All companies have the chance to figure out if their business model is resilient enough for this pandemic. If you're a company that can survive in a time like this, I think you have a pretty resilient business model going forward. That said, I don't think we need to be sitting here and saying, “look, we're going to be living in a pandemic mindset for the rest of our lives.” But I do think it's an opportunity for companies to say, “how can we be healthier, how can we have better unit economics, how can we do more with less?” That’s what we've been pushing a lot of our portfolio companies to figure out.

Has going virtual been an impediment to staying connected with other workers and portfolio companies?

Surprisingly, not as much as I thought. Maybe it's a function of venture capital. A lot of the job is already remote. You're talking to people from different parts of the country, different parts of the globe. Even within the same city, sometimes it's just more efficient to [make] a call. It's not 100 percent like it is now, but it's not as much of a shock for us as it is for other folks where they're going from zero to 100 percent. We're going from 40 or 60 percent remote pre-Covid, so it is not as much of a leap. About half of the companies that I work with are not in the city that I live in, so with them, it's pretty much business as normal. That said, it's still something that is very top of mind. At least with our firm, we lose out on the ad hoc conversations that happen when a random thought comes up and you can walk over to their office and have that conversation. Here, you have to be a lot more methodical and structured about how and when you communicate.

Helping our companies navigate work from home has been the most challenging because it's unusual if their employees are not in an office. They're having collaborative working sessions together all the time. To me, that was probably the biggest fear factor in terms of my portfolio companies - how is working from home going to impact these companies culturally, morale-wise. At the same time, I'm looking at the results of the portfolio companies are putting up, and it's pretty remarkable. For some companies, it's been difficult, but they haven't missed a beat. Their performance is better than ever. I don't know what the long term impacts are going to be, so we have to keep a really close eye on that going forward.

Hopefully, [when] the economy reopens more, a healthy mix will be nice for work-life balance. The fact that companies are doing so well [with a] remote environment will actually enhance the desirability of work from home. The other cool thing that could come from all this is now the stigma of work from home is going to completely go away. You can work from anywhere. Imagine being at a company where one month you're working in London and another in Hawaii, you're working at a truly remotely-distributed company. I think a lot more businesses will go down this path. Look at what Facebook announced [to shift thousands of jobs online]. How cool is that? Work at Facebook or Google, have an amazing career, but you could live anywhere in the world your heart desires!

Are you still making new investments? What does the startup field look like now?

We're making new investments, we're not stopping. It's a little cliché, but this is absolutely the best time to start a company. Venture funds are active right now, perhaps not in certain categories [that are] part of the “old world,” but certain sectors are doing incredibly well. There are so many people who are scared because they're unemployed right now, and scared for their health and financial well-being. They also know that when they do go back to work, their job could disappear again with the next shock. A lot of them will be thinking about how to add different skills to [their] toolkit to find a more resilient career. So, there's a huge opportunity for online education, as an example. Similar transformations will happen with digital health, e-commerce models, and company productivity software.

This is one of the best times to start a company because you can rethink old models and reshape the world that we live in. You are not encumbered by the legacy and burden of “business as usual.” You can build something for the “new world” and build [it in] a better and more resilient way. So, it's pretty exciting if you're an aspiring entrepreneur. Opportunities abound, and this is a time when amazing companies are built. We want to be active and betting on those types of entrepreneurs and companies right now. Our “doors” are open!

 
 

FoundersX discusses coronavirus response, work-life shifts and views toward the future

Our Sponsors June 22, 2020

Helen Liang from FoundersX sat down with BASES to examine impacts of COVID-19 to investment and startup strategy, as well as broader changes. FoundersX, one of BASES’s sponsors, is a venture capital firm based in Menlo Park investing in the next wave of deep-tech unicorns in enterprise AI and big data, quantum computing, FinTech, and other industries.

How has FoundersX had to adapt to COVID-19?

It has definitely been an interesting time for all of our team. We changed all the in-person meetings to Zoom meetings, including our own team meeting with startups. We don't see big challenges. Of course, it's a lot tougher for the trust building. Without meeting a startup founder in person— only talking on Zoom, we would be more cautions in making an investment decision. Ideally, you want to meet the founder in-person before you make the investment decision, but right now you just have to run more due diligence analysis, doing more Zoom calls and more reference checking.

How have your startups been faring amidst the crisis?

Actually, we are surprised to see them being so resilient. The startups have gone beyond our expectations. Within this time period, three of our companies were in discussion for acquisition. Two of them actually closed the deals last month, and another one still in consideration. So, we have definitely seen the business still growing, and venture investments are still very active. Of course, most investors are probably becoming a bit more conservative in allocating capital right now. And, a lot of founders will be more conservative in cash preservation as well. Hiring plans might be put on hold. But overall, we still see great resilience in the startups we have invested in. When we get portfolio updates, we still see solid gross revenue growth.

It could have been worse. We feel grateful for the turnout of our portfolio companies . We haven't seen anyone really struggling. We’ve a few companies which have given us pleasant surprises instead. So it has been very encouraging. One thing to have in mind is that , one month revenue hit might be a big deal for large companies because they are more operation driven. But for tech startups, the time span is a little bit different. You might not see a huge shift in one month, but if it lasts for three to six months, the startups will start to see more significant impact.

Do you foresee any lasting changes made to the structure of how business is done because of COVID-related shifts?

Yes. We're definitely going to see less travel, more online meetings and work-from-home mode. Some business might be permanently working from home. I believe companies will start to review their travel plans more. A lot of business travels might not be necessary. And many of the conferences can go online as well. So, how we work will definitely be forever changed.

This crisis will also force a lot of startup founders to think whether their company has a mechanism to deal with crisis. In a sense, it will force startup founders to think harder about what to do when you face a crisis like COVID-19.  Especially for hardware startups, such as AI chip or robotics company. When suddenly your global supply chain is going to be impacted and you can’t run lab experiments with teammates, what do you do?

How have you shifted your investment strategy because of coronavirus?

We are looking for data-driven business with machine learning as a growth engine across industries. That's our angle for making investments. With COVID-19, we definitely have more interests in healthcare.  This type of virus won't be a one-time thing. There will probably be ongoing challenges. We will see them more often in the future. So, we need more disruptive technologies coming into the biopharma industry. How can we expedite vaccine and new drug development? That is the one area we have since had more focus in our investment.

Which startups are more resilient and how can startups be more resilient given dramatic environmental changes?

I think it's related to their growth stage. When the startups are at the steady growth stage with loyal customers, they're less impacted by uncertainties. If they have raised enough capital, they are less worried about dramatic environment change. Within the next two to three months, they probably have to have a strategy to adapt to the change.  

Typically, we advise our startups to do the best-case-scenario and the worst-case-scenario planning. When they are prepared for the worst, that's part of their resilience and nothing can hurt them. They will only do more and do better. Or use it as a stress test, to strive for the best. We do believe, as, Winston Churchill said – “Never Waste a Good Crisis.”  We tell that to our founders when a crisis happens. Look at the crisis as an opportunity, and learn how to take it to make your team stronger, make your business stronger, and maybe find an opportunity that you have never paid attention before. That’d be making the most out of a crisis like COVID-19.

 
 

BASES Spotlight: BASES Co-Presidents Mallika Jhamb and Vibhav Mariwala reflect on past year, navigating BASES through the Coronavirus pandemic

BASES Spotlight April 24, 2020

Vibhav Mariwala, ‘20, and Mallika Jhamb, ‘21, led BASES during the 2019-2020 academic year. Vibhav is a History major and Psychology and Political Science double minor. Mallika is pursuing a Management Science Engineering major and an Economics minor. Through their leadership, external relations improved and BASES developed a stronger community. The Co-Presidents also provide their insights in bringing clarity during a global pandemic.

Can you tell me a little bit about yourself and your background in BASES? 

MJ: I joined BASES in the Spring of my Freshman year as a director on the Global Entrepreneurship team. Coming into Stanford, I was a Pre-Med majoring in Biochemistry. It took organic chemistry [for me to] realize that it just wasn't meant for me. I knew that I did not want to pursue research as a career, and this led me to re-evaluating my choices. I went to high school in the UK, but decided to come to the US because of the flexibility and plethora of extra-curricular resources. So, that change came in the winter quarter—people usually go through the “sophomore slump”—I went through a mini version in freshman year. I started talking to different faculty, trying to figure out what excited me most and ended up choosing Management Science and Engineering as my major. When I was talking to my major advisor, Prof. Tom Byers, I learned that BASES was omnipresent in this space. I knew I wanted to put what I was learning in MS&E into action because entrepreneurship to me was always a buzzword. I'd been exposed to it because of side projects in high school, but not truly to the extent that Silicon Valley is known for entrepreneurship. So, my best bet would be to learn by doing, which is why I decided to try again (after not getting in through Frosh Battalion). I ended up joining as a director on the Global Entrepreneurship team, which was led by Vibhav. All throughout high school, I was really passionate about empowering women (I still am :)) and understanding their trajectory in different careers, so I knew this is what I hoped to pursue within BASES. I knew that I I wanted to learn and grow as a leader, and learn more about entrepreneurship while pursuing the cause that I was passionate about.

VM: I'm a senior now, and I'm graduating in [a few] months. That's crazy. I'm majoring in History, double minoring in Psych and Political Science, but I also jokingly say, I’m in an entrepreneurship class because running BASES is essentially a five-to-seven unit class. [It’s] by far one of the best experiences I've ever had here. I got to meet so many people, especially a lot of underclassmen who I wouldn't have met otherwise. It was very engaging because I'm focusing on things I don't cover in class at all. I'm dealing a lot with VCs, with excellent sponsors, with the university administration, learning how to budget, managing people, making sure people are motivated and committed to just a student organization. And, to be perfectly honest, I applied to BASES at the end of my freshman year. I was not in Frosh Battalion, I did not know what BASES was in my freshman year up until I had this mini existential crisis of, okay, what have I done apart from writing for The Daily and going to class and socializing? I think my mom actually told me about BASES because she heard about it from some friends who graduated from Stanford. And it seemed interesting, I just wasn't sure that entrepreneurship was my thing because when you're here in Silicon Valley, it's like, Oh, are you an entrepreneur, are you starting a start-up and dropping out of school. I wasn't really in the mood for that because I enjoy school, so why would I want to commit my time to a project when I'm still a freshman? That was my initial thinking, and then I ended up looking at the different applications for the different teams that were out there, and ended up joining.

How was being president of BASES a learning experience? 

VM: The best way to summarize my experiences is in three questions I try to ask: What do you want out of this experience, how can I help you get what you want out of this experience, and what can I do to make your life in this organization as easy as possible. Those are the three questions I've asked every almost director that has approached us. At Stanford, we’re very spoiled with all the speakers and resources we have, so why BASES? And that's why our platform rested on professional development, community development, and also team collaboration. Now I do think we could have done a lot more and ran things better, but just trying to really promote some sort of community, whether it was a Halloween party or a Dish hike, it's hard to get people to come. But Mallika and I both prioritized drawing boundaries between being friends but also being VPS and directors. So even with everyone on Exec, I can have a conversation one-on-one with every single Exec member, and that's something that’s been very helpful to make sure our [team has been] very cohesive and very willing to work with each other and provide open, honest feedback.

MJ: I've learned a lot about administration within the university, and how to deal with different stakeholders. It's something that's mentioned so often, yet something that’s not truly understood. If you truly want to be an entrepreneurial leader, entrepreneur or founder, you have to know how to balance each party. Our main aim was to be most transparent without jeopardizing our activities, and the needs & wants of our members. This year, we were able to establish a good relationship with the administration, and gained invaluable mentors through the process. This was one of the biggest learning experiences. The other is how to lead an organization of 100+ people. It is really important to have conversations centered around the bigger picture: What are the consequences of the decisions we are making? How can we be better leaders? Are we staying true to our principles and values? And as entrepreneurial student leaders, why don't we take heed to ethical entrepreneurship? There’s definitely steps that we've both taken, but there’s also a big learning curve. No one could have predicted that Coronavirus would have happened this year, but we learned adapt to our current scenario, and keep the larger picture in mind. The main thing is being proactive and leading those discussions. 

What is one challenge you’ve dealt with in leadership?

MJ: We tried to make sure that this was an open space for everyone to have a conversation. There's definitely more we could have done looking back. But I think our main goal was to strengthen the organization and its people because we’ve had a high turnover rate in the past. The challenges in building community are centered around the fact that there were so many people, and it’s harder on a larger scale. We had an all-BASES retreat , which was attended by a lot of the freshmen and some directors, but not everyone was as interested. But we tried. What we realized is that we needed to create a value-add for our members, apart from the events they lead. We’ve had skill building workshops and career workshops for freshman, but we wanted to find a way to scale it. So, true to our mission statement, we did this though establishing a Professional Development Team. We had some difficulty with setting the team, but by the end of winter quarter, we established a great team that has lead some amazing internal events. Overall, understanding how to best cater to each member’s need is challenging in such a large organization but we're constantly incorporating feedback!

VM: There's a lot of other management and a lot of things that directors [and VPs] don't even know about. As one of Stanford's oldest and largest organizations, we fundraise a lot, so there's a lot more oversight from the university. We [have worked and still] work with the Office of Student Engagement, and, for the first time in a while, we’ve had a good reputation with them. We also have an oversight board within the university with people from corporate relations, from the endowment, we have faculty advisors that we work with. And we work a lot with STVP, so we're working with at least four to five different offices. It’s just a question of how do you as a student get taken seriously and have your input treated as equally as someone in a professional role. That's been a very good learning [but] challenging experience for both of us because, [even though] you’re the president of a student organization, you’re still a student at the end of the day. 

How has BASES informed your academic and career plans? 

MJ: I think one of the most rewarding part of my experience within BASES is how I was exposed to different stakeholders within the realm of entrepreneurship. Throughout my journey, I’ve learned that my strengths lie in working with people, and in the future, I see myself working in a fast-paced entrepreneurial environment. I can say for a fact that I have brought the skills and knowledge that I have gained through BASES, to classes and broader conversations. I think leading BASES has expedited my understanding on what goes into building an organization, and led me to reflect on my decisions as a leader. What I have learned through leading BASES, is that cultivating relationships and learning how to manage them is critical. I think putting yourself in the other person’s shoes to understand their perspective is the first step in doing so. I personally believe that I have met some of the most inspiring leaders and mentors because of BASES and the advice I have gained has been invaluable.

VM: I think every member has a different, nuanced take on entrepreneurship. I come from a family of entrepreneurs. My grandfather, both my grandparents and my parents have had their own companies in some way. Growing up, [I thought] entrepreneurship was a buzzword. To be fair, I still don't know all the nuances of being an entrepreneur. There's a lot more I wish I could have learned. But I think if you want to be a successful entrepreneur, you need to be really good at cultivating, maintaining, and advancing your relationships with people. You need to be genuinely vulnerable and just be a good nice normal person as weird as that sounds. One thing Mallika and I have talked a lot about is the “so what?” of why you’re starting a company. Is it just to be the next Google, Facebook, Snapchat, or is it because there's some issue that you identify with that you wanted to try to solve through starting a company.

What has your experience been trying to lead such a large organization in the pandemic?

MJ: Vibhav and I knew we needed to do something about it. Being the largest student organization on campus, we have the resources, and we've gained so much from this community that we need to give back. The first thing we did was reach out to all our members to make sure they were okay and doing well, and if they needed any support. We then spoke to our Executive board to go over the possible ways in which we could respond, creating meaningful impact. After multiple meetings with our Exec board, and internal administrative board, we decided to publish our response in the form of a letter to make sure that our stakeholders are aware of our response. We are taking our time to figure out how to best support the Stanford community as well as our local community. We want to cater to our members’ needs, and also make sure that we were being transparent with all our stakeholders because we feel responsible for our sponsors, alumni, and the broader student community. We hope to build and provide entrepreneurial resources for our community through newsletters in the short-term, but are still working on our long-term response, through which we hope to make the most impact to our community. While it hasn’t been easy, given that everyone is in different parts of the world, I think being proactive in leading these conversations and ensuring that we’re on the same page in our response is very important.

VM: When Covid-19 hit and all students were asked to leave campus, Mallika and I knew that we had to come up with a coherent response to ensure that BASES can function as an organization and to ensure members are still engaged with us. BASES luckily has the ability to make an immense difference to campus, and in the face of this pandemic, we realized we could mobilize our resources to help. The question was not if we should do something, but what we should do to guarantee the largest impact?, Over the past year, when BASES has had tough questions, Mallika and I have turned to our Executive Board and our advisors who have been immensely supportive. Leading an organization like BASES requires consensus and transparency, and to develop a cogent response to the crisis, we wanted to ensure we factored in the perspectives of our stakeholders. After a series of meetings with VPs, the full executive team, and our internal advisors, we published our response on our website, and our working to develop resources for the Stanford community related to entrepreneurship. Coordinating meetings across time zones, and factoring in these different perspectives was challenging, but it showed me that the best way to lead an organization in tough times is to be upfront. Consequently, we agreed to move our programming virtually and focus on professional development. 

 
 
Marissa Luna, ‘20 (left), and Constanza Hasselmann, ‘21 (right), led the Social Impact team for the 2019-2020 year.

Marissa Luna, ‘20 (left), and Constanza Hasselmann, ‘21 (right), led the Social Impact team for the 2019-2020 year.

 
 

BASES Spotlight: Social Impact Co-VPs Marissa Luna and Constanza Hasselmann discuss teamwork, leadership and the importance of social impact

BASES Spotlight April 12, 2020

1. Can you tell me a little bit about where you're from and why you're interested in social impact?

Marissa Luna: I am a senior majoring in Science, Technology, and Society with a concentration in Innovation and Organization. I am also working on my master’s coursework in Sustainability Science and Practice. As for a little bit more about my background, I am originally from Northern Virginia, and I came to Stanford very excited to pursue economics but also human biology. I definitely believe I found that intersection of business and health within the STS major and the Sustainability master’s program. A common thread that extends from my academic curriculum to my professional endeavors and to my extracurricular involvement here is the theme of how to make a positive social impact working toward a more sustainable world. I believe I can best make an impact by empowering communities, specifically women and girls, through education - a theme that I have been able to explore through our Social Impact Team’s programming. 

Constanza Hasselmann: I am a junior majoring in sociology, minoring in human rights. I was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and grew up in the Washington DC area. I was able to attend public school in Northern Virginia, but would not have been able to [with] the same degree or quality in Brazil. And for my interest initially in education policy, mostly from being so close to DC, when I came to Stanford, I knew that I wanted to focus on people. And that led me to not only care about people based on the values and my beliefs but want to do something to change the status of this crazy world. For me, what I found most interesting [was] the intersection of business— there's this whole entrepreneurship craze on campus— and social impact is more of a challenge. So the inherent idea of a double or triple bottom line is that it's harder to achieve, requiring more thought and more intentionality. 

2. What was it like to organize and run the annual Social Impact Case Competition this past Fall? 

ML: Our case competition is the largest event of the year for the Social Impact Team. The competition involves countless people and components from working with mentors and judges, to deciding on a case, to identifying a venue, to marketing among students, among other responsibilities. In other words, this event requires a significant commitment of time and energy as we start planning the event about five months in advance, but the creativity and innovation that the participants share on the day of the competition make everything so worthwhile.

CH: Yeah, it's a big undertaking. For people who just see it from the outside, and who see it hopefully running smoothly, it's easy to say, ‘oh this is just a couple of things you sort of gather and it comes together.’ But if you look at a lot of the back work that’s necessary, [for] the case that [was] so thoughtfully presented when they walk in, who not only who's going to write that, what's the content going to be, are we going to be about the organization that we choose to pair with a problem that we choose to tackle. And that's without even getting into the actual logistics: organizing the room, working with Stanford, and make sure that we have everything in line, safety wise. Then marketing the event which is something that's usually left last, but we can't forget about because we need people to turn out to it. So, there's a lot of moving pieces, but it's one of those things that when it comes together, you're just appreciative of all the hard work that [went] into it, especially when students have great feedback such as, ‘Oh, this didn't work out so well but overall what I had was really great; man, I learned so much, now I'm exposed to this whole new area that I wasn't before’, so that's really the goal of a lot of the programming we do. It's always really rewarding when that's the feedback we get, so we can improve for future years. 

ML: Exactly, this undertaking is possible because of the commitment and collaboration to make all of the moving pieces (that Constanza was talking about) happen. If I could capture the case competition in one word, I would choose “team” - because the event not only takes the massive investment of time and effort of the Social Impact Team but also of BASES as a whole such as our Co-Presidents and Frosh Battalion. Additionally, beyond the BASES community, there is a large emphasis on team right when you arrive at the Case Competition because you immediately begin working with the team you came in with or the team that you were assigned to in order to craft your pitches in response to the case. We want to continue emphasizing team through every part of the competition. 

CH: And huge shout out to our BASES Social Impact team because the ten of them, who are all directors, all have their own programming, so they're all running their [own things]. That’s how our team functions as opposed to other teams—we feel like that keeps people interested, motivated, passionate about what they're working on, and it means that we have more awesome programming to share with the community. It also means the Case Competition where everyone has to pitch in is an additional requirement. They were super supportive and helped in every single aspect. We could not have done it without them. And as Marissa was saying, [the] idea of team is really integral to the whole case.

3. What is your main priority right now that you guys are planning for the future? 

ML: One of our main priorities is really fostering a team environment among our directors who are all planning their respective events. Something that plays very much hand-in-hand with our team structure and environment is that we aim to encourage each person to take ownership of their event(s). We are, of course, all there to support one another with program logistics and marketing, but we also want to recognize that each person has creative freedom for and initiative over their events.

CH: We're looking at one event that focuses on entrepreneurship and networking skills for students in the FLI community. This is coming up through  a partnership with BEAM, so super exciting. Then, also looking at winter [quarter], we're trying to put together some larger events [and] speakers that look at social impact from different angles. And our biggest priority at the moment is seeing if we can unify the social impact community on campus a little bit, not necessarily as BASES, but as members who care about this space. And such things we're thinking about all, we always have to foster team building like Marissa was saying and keep up with BASES Exec news which is crucial t as well. The VP role is about juggling distinct priorities at once - which is good practice for the real world. It’s fun to see planned programming start coming together. 

4. What is something you would like to share for next year’s social impact VPs? 

ML: I have been on the Social Impact team since the end of my first year, so I have had the opportunity to work with a variety of incredibly brilliant and capable leaders dedicated to social impact. Learning from them has definitely been a pleasure. Although there is not one specific formula to have a wonderful and productive year since each team formation in the past has been different, one piece of advice I would want to offer is keep learning from those around you, exploring your passions, and fostering strong relationships with others. One of my favorite quotes is: “I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel” (Maya Angelou). As a leader, I aim to be intentional with what I do and how I carry out these actions. I would encourage next year’s SI VPs to focus not only on what they are doing but how and with whom they are working.

CH: Echoing some of that, something that's really crucial that we've done well and I'm happy about is communication. On two fronts, one is among the co-VPs, if that's your style of management. It’s important to be on the same page with one another. It's really important that whenever you go into a meeting with the whole team, or even if you go into [a meeting with the Executive team], whenever you are representing the team in any capacity, that you're on the same page, so there's not awkward moments or lapses of like, ‘Oh, I thought we were doing this.’ And that will happen just because you're different people, so  you can read the same thing but have completely different interpretations. Thus it’s crucial to be on the same page about things and have this aligned vision for the team. You can have different priorities, you can have different skill sets, and that’s actually a good thing because it means leaders’ skills are complementary. It works better but as long as you're in alignment with one another.The hope is that that fosters a sense of open communication within the team such that if people are overwhelmed, people want to switch them. That just creates a better team dynamic and environment. [It’s] one thing that we've been really big on, and I hope to see future leaders continue is that honing down. Then, secondly, is letting directors run with their ideas. One of the most powerful things that we've seen is people say, ‘I'm passionate in this, I know a little bit about this, I want to learn a little bit more about this,”and allowing all those things to come together in a way that feels natural. Obviously there needs to be some pushing along to make sure things get done, and our role isn't to force people to do things, it's to allow their ideas to take shape and to take form that in a way that's meaningful to them and will be impactful to the Stanford community. That's where some of our best programming ideas have come from, is by allowing our directors to use their incredible talent and put something together that works well. 

5. Are you interested in going into social impact as a career? How did your experience and BASES inform that decision?

CH: I definitely knew beforehand that I was more interested in things social-impact related back then, not, I think, as I was saying before, that business and social impact or however that you want to categorize that right CSR social entrepreneurship right philanthropic things that are, LLC models that have a little bit more of that risk embedded into it. I think these are new models that are coming up, and that they interest me because they're inherently more challenging. Right. And I think that introducing these kind of nuanced perspectives and forms of social enterprise to the Stanford community is what's made me can continue to be excited about this - because I find out about new forms in the space every day.  Through BASES I had the opportunity to TA ETL (Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders), and that's been really awesome because I'm hearing from these business leaders about how they're including. Corporate Social Responsibility into their business models and how that's something that it's allowed them to not only profit more but be better business community members. And so I think that it's allowed me to learn more, it's allowed me to engage more directly with these leaders, and it's given me a wider perspective that I wouldn't have had otherwise.

ML: I would echo a very similar sentiment because I came  to Stanford passionate about discovering the intersection between business and health. My academic coursework paired with my professional endeavors and my extracurricular involvement have allowed me to navigate my interests in the social impact space. This past summer, I interned with the Women Leaders in Global Health Initiative, which aims to elevate women leaders in global health through the e-learning platform, in-person convenings, among other strategies. With that experience and with other roles such as leading BASES this year or directing a nonprofit called SHE++, I am grateful for the opportunities to explore social impact from a variety of perspectives—from the realms of education, tech, consulting, nonprofits, among others. In all, I have definitely seen the power of empowering communities and elevating voices. With my social impact experience gained inside and outside the classroom, I have learned from other people how to best lead by example and work toward transformative change. 

 
 
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BASES Spotlight: Former BASES Co-President Andrew Blum reflects on past year and experiences

BASES Spotlight November 1, 2019

Andrew Blum, Class of 2020, was the BASES Co-President with Sabina Beleuz Neagu for the 2018-2019 academic year. He is majoring in Political Science and minoring in Mandarin, and is also very interested in the intersection of politics and business.

1. What was it like being co-president of BASES as just a junior? What did you learn?

It was a great experience. I learned more [while] being the President of BASES than I have as a student or doing anything [else] on campus. You really understand what it takes to lead an organization but also motivate individuals, and to organize people. I think that is a skill that you do not really get unless you take a leadership role in a student organization. And there are so many parallels between that and the real world. 

2. How did you balance being the president with your other extracurriculars?

I wasn't really involved in other extracurriculars. When you become president of an organization, it becomes your baby and your responsibility, so that comes first. Whether you’re in a class, or interning for another startup, all of those things were minor roles and being present is so much more encompassing than that. You have to be constantly engaged with other people and thinking, what could be better, what could be worse? It’s very fast paced, especially in the quarter system.

3. Why did you originally want to join BASES?

[In the beginning of] my freshman year, I didn’t even know about BASES. A friend of mine said, you have to go to this info session about entrepreneurship for a great organization on campus. I knew I was interested in entrepreneurship in high school, but I didn’t know what I wanted to do [at Stanford]. I went to the info session, and initially I remember being ‘so what’ and being very unimpressed. I don’t know what changed my mind. I remember reading up on different teams, and I decided to apply to some of the teams. I was given a lot of responsibilities as a freshman, [so] it engaged me from the beginning.

4. When did you know that you wanted to be president of BASES?

Last year, I remember [my co-President] Sabina had said to me that she wanted to run, and it was something that I was considering, and I was overwhelmed with all the work. I remember thinking, ‘I’m a sophomore, I can’t do it, I just don’t know if I have the capacity.’ My friends and my family encouraged me to take the position. I’m really happy that I did because I learned a lot more doing this than in my summer internship. I initially didn’t think that I was going to do it, and Sabina told me why she wanted to run and the new things we could do with BASES, and I found that really exciting. So, [I knew I wanted to be president of BASES] after talking to her, and actually, we had to rearrange our abroad plans because we were going at the same time. 

5. How did your roles in freshman and sophomore year differ?

I had a unique role freshman year. I already had a kind-of leadership [role in the BGarage team], but as a VP my sophomore year, it’s different because a lot of the people are very dedicated towards BASES, whereas as a freshman, there was more of an impetus to follow through. But when I was leading a team, obviously there were people who flaked and dropped off, but there were also people who were super strong and followed through. [Current BASES co-President] Vibhav was one of those people. And that was really great because you were able to work with your team and get the outcome whereas as a freshman, it was about getting my own work done and delegating a bit. As a VP, it was a lot more cohesive working together. 

6. How do you see BASES growing and improving in the future?

There are a bunch of [student] entrepreneurship organizations on this campus and in Silicon Valley. There didn’t use to be, and BASES used to be the only one, and now there’s a lot of competition. What does that mean for our sponsors? What does that mean for how BASES can attract the best students on campus? What does that mean for the activities and events that they plan? I think Sabina and I were really trying to address that and understand, what is our niche and what is our competitive process? Sabina and I looked at it on this high, systemic level of what value we bring to our community. And some of our answers were making BASES more diverse, connecting and doing events with other entrepreneurship clubs on campus, and having more global events. Not just events focused on Silicon Valley, but also focused on innovation in different parts of the world. [We asked,] what can we learn about information here by looking at innovation elsewhere? I started the Global Entrepreneurship Conference, and we still have the Global Entrepreneurship team that continues to thrive today, and I’m very happy with that.

7. Why do you find the intersection of politics and business so interesting? 

I definitely think business is very interesting to me, and it kind of comes naturally. I went to a for-profit high school, which was very focused on innovation, and I took entrepreneurship classes in high school. And just being in New York, so much value is added from the private sector, and you can really see that in the city. I was super privileged to have that experience, and I loved it. Entrepreneurship is really cool because you’re tackling a really large problem and getting a small group of people together, trying to figure out a problem that a big company can’t solve. I hope business, entrepreneurship, and politics are mechanisms for producing change in society. They operate obviously on very different levels, and the outcomes can be vastly different, but I currently see them both as ways to enact large change, and that is very inspirational to me. I think entrepreneurship and business, especially in the short run, are easier [fields to enter], and for a young person, easier to take part in. 

 
 
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Alma by Akshay Ramaswamy

Stanford Startups November 28, 2018

Akshay Ramaswamy, a senior, is a co-founder of Alma, “a social-academic college network geared towards helping students meet other students on their college campus and plan their academic paths.” The startup has recently garnered attention for receiving $1 million seed funding from investors such as Marissa Mayer.


1. How did you come up with the idea for Alma?

Akshay Ramaswamy: I was the first kid from my school to ever get into Stanford, and I had no one to ask questions to when coming here. It was super hard to navigate through thousands of classes and hundreds of clubs while trying to also make new friends. As an RA last year, I wanted to build a platform that would help alleviate this problem - thus we created Alma, a super powerful directory that would show profiles of people on your campus with information specific to college.

2. How has your startup changed since its establishment?

Akshay Ramaswamy: We were initially a schedule sharing platform, but since then we’ve added more features to make it more of a network, with a newsfeed and group messaging.

3. What was it like to have to go through the process of receiving funding?

Akshay Ramaswamy: We pitched 3-4 days a week all of spring quarter, driving to SF or Sand Hill Road. We learned a lot from out first few pitches, and after about a month we were very polished - I could recite our pitchdeck and metrics in my sleep. We learned to focus on the vision and the future in our pitches rather than the small details and that made all the difference.

4. Would you say Stanford’s startup-friendly environment helped you along the way of creating your startup?

Akshay Ramaswamy: For sure - we went through the Pear Startup Garage and Cardinal Ventures, both of which gave us a crash course on building a company - from legal things and hiring to accounting and finding product market fit.

5. Given that the startup has taken up a sizeable amount of your time, what motivated you to keep dedicating your time when you were busy with school and other extracurricular activities?

Akshay Ramaswamy: I think the biggest shift for me was cutting out other extracurriculars and making sure to schedule in my company like it was a 10-unit class. This way, no matter what’s happening in my classes, I stay disciplined to work on Alma consistently.

6. How do you define roles for employees and yourself in your company?

Akshay Ramaswamy: Since we’re a startup of 4 people and two contractors, we’re small enough such that everyone pretty much works on everything. We play to people’s strengths, however - some people are better at frontend design, others specialize in backend infrastructure. If there’s a skill we don’t think we have on the team, we go out and hire them. That’s how we went out and found our UI/UI designer, who’s was a crucial addition to the team given our lack of knowledge on UI/UX principles.

7. What are your future plans?

Akshay Ramaswamy: We’re currently expanding to other schools and hiring! The goal is to be at around 10 schools by this time next year, and we’re currently at Stanford, USC, and Cal. If anyone is interested in working with an up and coming Stanford startup with venture funding and a stellar set of investors (Marissa Mayer, LinkedIn execs) we’d love to talk to them!

 
 
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Stanford Startup Spotlight: Seer Tracking, Amber Yang

Stanford Startups October 24, 2018

Amber Yang is a sophomore at Stanford studying Physics and Computer Science who founded and currently operates Seer Tracking. Seer Tracking’s mission is to track and map space debris in Low Earth Orbit for the purposes of reducing space debris collision risk with space missions. Seer Tracking uses Artificial Neural Network software in order recognize and predict space debris paths and potential collisions.

1. Where did your company Seer Tracking come from?

Amber Yang: This actually started as a project that I did in high school, actually for a science fair. I got the inspiration for the project because I grew up in Orlando, really near the Kennedy Space Center, so I really loved space from a really young age and then, later on, when astronaut Scott Kelly spent his year in space I would watch his Facebook livestreams and a lot of times he would say that he would have duck out from the International Space Station and into another capsule because there was danger of the Space Station being hit by debris.

That really got me thinking — I saw a lot of articles in the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times talking about the space debris problem so I started reading some papers and realized that the current methods of tracking debris often times have a lot of error so people can’t really predict where the debris will go simply because there is so much drag and various atmospheric effects that are impacting the debris. These papers were also using a mathematical model that made it really hard to model drag and these other atmospheric and weather effects and so I had this idea to use artificial intelligence to recognize the patterns in how the debris’ orbits change over time to predict future orbits.

I had this idea when I was sophomore in high school and then I worked on it for about two years in high school, competed in some science fairs for it, and then after high school, I realized that with a lot of these science fairs, a lot of times the projects don’t really end up going anywhere and people end up abandoning these projects when they go to college and I thought that would be a big shame because these are some really big problems that need to be solved. I really wanted to see my idea come to use so that’s what gave me the motivation to create a startup.

2. What were the kinds of technical resources that you were looking at when you started your project?

Amber Yang: I actually programmed everything in MATLAB, which I know might make a lot of people at Stanford cringe, but MATLAB has an AI library that's actually really easy to use if you’ve never worked with AI before and I had never worked with AI before – actually, I barely even knew how to code when I started the project. So, MATLAB was a really easy language to pick up and then the AI library was very easy to implement from there which made my experience using AI a lot easier.

In terms of the data I used, at first, I actually simulated all of my data using a normal standard deviation to create random samples of debris but then I later realized that there are space debris databases publicly available online that anyone can access – websites like spacetrack.org. That’s when I started to do more testing with my idea.

I feel like when you have an idea, it can be really daunting to try implement it and a lot of times you might lack the technical skills, but even now, after I’ve finished developing a lot of my project, I still don’t think I’m fully versed in artificial intelligence, and I’ve only really tested my project on my personal computer — I haven’t looked into things like GPU’s.

When you are first starting out with your idea, I would try to make it as easy as possible as you can and then maybe once you’ve developed some type of prototype and you have the idea to create a company, that’s when you can really delegate harder, advanced technical tasks to people who are really well-versed in those things. So just really taking advantage of all your opportunities and resources and also asking for help — always being willing to learn and admit that you don’t know something.

3. What is the state of the company right now?

Amber Yang: The company is actually being incorporated next week! I also actually just got accepted into an accelerator based in Toronto, called Creative Destruction Lab, and their focus is actually in space startups so I’m actually going to be traveling to Canada once every two months to work on the company there and have mentorship from them.

Right now, I have not raised any funding for the company. I’ve bootstrapped everything because it's really been only me developing the software and I don’t need to pay myself a salary or anything and I’m trying to delay as much, as possible, the time when I give away equity of the company. I’m also actually currently talking with three potential customers, one of which I’m actually getting data from so I’m trying to test the robustness of the software and then also to trying to customize our first software packaging based on their experiences. Research and development and then creating a start up are very different — in order to operate all of the software right now, you really need to know how to code so I’m in the process of creating a user interface for it. We’re still a little bit in the development of the software stage but hopefully customizing it for the customer.

By the end of the year, I’m hoping to close the deals with these two customers and then potentially raise a seed funding round simply because I’m hoping to expand the team — right now it's just me, I have an advisor in the Aero / Astro department here and then a potential CTO — but its really hard being a student while also developing software while also trying to develop the business of the company. I’m definitely looking to expand the team and hire some technical people.

4. What has the development process been like for commercializing your software and making it commercially available?

Amber Yang: As I mentioned, everything’s written in MATLAB so my first plan of action has been to finish converting it to Python and C++ so that’s been a bit of a struggle to manage with classes. After that, in terms of software licensing, I have a lot to learn in that aspect so i’m really looking to bring on another person to the team who is experienced with software licensing, software development, and things like that.

A visualization of Seer Tracking’s space debris tracking software.

5. How are you balancing your schoolwork and schedule alongside your company work?

Amber Yang: It’s a lot! One thing that I’m hesitant to do is bring on new people especially because this idea started only with me, so it can feel weird to bring on other people, but it's a very necessary step. In terms of my day, I go to classes from 8:30 to 4 or 5 everyday and then work on psets at night but typically I try to work on code on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays and then Tuesdays and Thursdays, I’m working with someone in the accelerator in order to come up with a business plan and scaling plan of how to scale the company. With a lot of these operations, I think it's dumb for me to hold all of it on to myself so right now I’m definitely looking to expand the team.

6. How has the process of learning how to start a company been for you?

Amber Yang: When I incorporated the company, I actually signed on with a lawyer firm here in Palo Alto and they’ve actually taken care of all the incorporation details for me and I think especially when you are a young founder, take advantage of the opportunity that you're young and that a lot of people are more willing to help you just because they know you have a lot in your future.

Honestly, when you are trying to learn the basics of starting a company, making connections is probably the single most important thing you can do, not only with lawyers or VC’s, but actually with other young founders. For example, I got to meet a lot of people from the Thiel Fellowship group and I think talking to them and asking them questions about the founding process has been really helpful for me.

At this point, when I have a question or a concern, either asking someone or looking it up online and learning as you go through it has been my process. I think that's why, when you look at a lot of arguments about why founders should drop out, you realize that even if I were to go to business school and get an MBA degree, I wouldn’t be in the nitty-gritty works of actually starting a company and getting it off the ground because I think that's where you can actually learn a lot of stuff from.
7. One might think that tracking space debris should be the government’s job or responsibility — why should a private company be handling this?

Amber Yang: This has been a problem that the government has been dealing with essentially since the space race and I would say that increasingly, we are seeing space getting farther away from the government in a way and I think that a lot of times government technology development can be very slow and I think that the reason that we are seeing a lot of progress in space recently is because a lot of these technologies are being handled by private companies — SpaceX, for instance, has developed so much in the past couple of years and I really think its because the energy of startups is so much different from the government. People are very excited to do new things and I think that because of that you can see real tangible things and technologies come to fruition a lot quicker. I would say, for example, the government knows about what I’m doing but I don’t think they’ve been exploring the idea of using AI to track debris, I think they are sticking with their method. The importance for having a startup to handle these technologies is to keep coming up with these new ideas and then hopefully dealing with other private space industries just so we have our own type of ecosystem that keeps pushing out its own new developments.

8. How are you thinking about your company future for the next 6 months?

Amber Yang: My biggest goal is to finish development of the software so that I can demo it as a finalized product — that is my first and foremost priority. I think that a lot of times especially in Silicon Valley, you can get caught up between trying to raise money and getting customers before the project is completely finished and a lot of times people end up releasing bad beta versions but I think that for me, I really want to focus on getting the software and the technology to the best state possible just because I’m dealing in a very risky business –– predicting where things go into space is quite a big deal so I really want to finish development, make the software very professional and then probably within the next 6 months, hopefully get some customers to agree to buy a license after the development is completely finished. Between that time and now, I also plan bring on some people onto the team and potentially raise a small seed round.