Bob is a senior business executive and entrepreneur specializing in creating and building viable new businesses. He is currently focused on renewable energy and clean tech opportunities with a particular emphasis on early stage investment and mentoring. His entrepreneurial skills have been demonstrated with over 27 years of successful development and construction of new power plants, acquisition of operating companies and the startup of many companies in the power and climate arenas. He has joint ventured with over 15 different utility, private equity and equipment manufacturers in new business opportunities and created over $7 billion in new capital investments.
Troy is a seasoned entrepreneur who has built multiple successful technology-based businesses from the ground-up over a 30+ year period. With one foot firmly rooted in technology and the other firmly rooted in business he seamlessly bridges the divide between business and technology to create profitable organizations quickly. Troy excels in situations where innovation and creativity are required to solve real business problems. Troy is currently a Managing Director at MATH Venture Partners. Specialties: Creating order out of chaos and taking companies from early stage through profitability.
Ludwig has been on all sides of venture — as an entrepreneur, corporate buyer of start-ups, and venture capitalist. These days, he is on the venture side of the table with Alumni Ventures, a $1.2B cross-sector and stage group investing in ~400 companies per year. At AV, Ludwig manages funds seeking to build wealth for individuals in the Columbia University (116 Street Fund) and Brown University (Waterman Fund) communities as well as institutional investors interested in custom venture portfolios. Before Alumni Ventures, he experienced the daily realities of entrepreneurship as Founder and CEO of a mobile payments venture that served over 12 million people. Earlier, at a Fortune 100 telecommunications manufacturer (Nokia), he held general manager and business development roles that included investing in and acquiring venture-backed businesses. His first experience in venture capital was focused on enterprise and mobile software before and after the dot.com crash. Ludwig began his career as a strategy consultant with the Boston Consulting Group. He has a BA from Brown University and an MBA from Columbia. He lives in NYC with his wife and 2 teenagers
Zach Aarons is an award-winning PropTech investor, best selling author, professor, and speaker who has been a pioneering thought leader at the forefront of real estate technology for over a decade. In 2010, while working as a Project Manager for internationally renowned large scale mixed-use real estate developer Millennium Partners, Zach began investing in early-stage PropTech companies, quickly becoming the most active angel investor in the space with over 50 portfolio companies. In 2015, Zach parlayed his experiences in the real estate and technology sectors to found MetaProp, devoting his career to the mission of utilizing technology to make real estate more affordable, accessible, sustainable, and resilient. Since founding MetaProp, Zach and his team have invested in 75 PropTech companies.
Ashley is currently a Principal at VamosVentures, an early-stage fund based in Los Angeles investing in Latinx and diverse founders, where she invests in all consumer verticals. She started her career at Morgan Stanley in Capital Markets and moved into strategic roles at Shoptiques.com, Saks Fifth Avenue, and Estee Lauder focused on the intersection of the consumer and technology. She was previously an investor at Brand Foundry Ventures, Founders Factory, and Dorm Room Fund across commerce, health and wellness, and financial technology. Ashley holds a BA from Brown University and an MBA from MIT Sloan. She was born and raised in New York City to a Puerto Rican mother and Turkish immigrant father.
Khalil Fuller is a partner and Head of Dorm at Pear VC. Khalil graduated from Brown University with an independent concentration in Social Innovation and Education and earned a joint MBA/MA from Stanford as a Knight-Hennessey Scholar. Khalil is a serial entrepreneur, with his companies having cumulatively reached $100M in revenue and more than 5M users. He has founded startups such as Learn Fresh, an EdTech company looking to make math fun by integrating sports and entertainment; Trak Changes, a software platform for construction contractors; and Gift Card Bank, a nonprofit that looked to help low-income families in need during the pandemic. At Pear, Khalil is a leader in backing student entrepreneurs.
Olivia Tulkoff is an investor at Lead Edge Capital, a leading growth equity firm in New York. Olivia graduated with a degree in Public Policy and is a proud VWV alumnus and former co-director! Following graduation, Olivia joined Goldman Sachs as an Investment Banker in the Real Estate group before moving to the investing world. At Lead Edge, she specializes in investing in software, internet, and tech-enabled services companies.
