Asian Tech Leaders

Jae Lee is the Founder and CEO of Twelve Labs, a video understanding platform that uses AI to help developers and companies search and understand videos quickly. Using its state-of-the-art multimodal foundation model for videos that can accurately and instantly search exact moments within petabytes of video archives, generate coherent text summaries of videos, perform prompt-based video generation, and many more. Jae and his co-founders started the company in 2021 and has secured funding from prominent VCs including Index Ventures and Radial Ventures, and has been recognized as one of CB Insights' AI 100 companies.

Prior to starting Twelve Labs, Jae was an award-winning cyber security leader for the South Korean army and he previously spent time as a software engineer at Amazon and Samsung. Jae graduated from UC Berkeley where he studied computer science.

In this episode, you will learn:

Where Jae is seeing the highest value from multimodal GenAI applications

Why Jae believed that multimodal AI was the future and decided to start Twelve Labs

How building Twelve Labs with a geographically diverse team is an edge

Jae’s upbringing in Seoul and moving to the US with his uncle who sparked his imagination in math and statistics

You can follow Jae on Twitter and learn more about Twelve Labs at https://twelvelabs.io/

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Timestamps:

(00:01) Early Trends in Generative AI Technology

(11:55) Building Multimodal AI

(23:27) Exploring Curiosity and Statistical Learning

(28:31) Navigating Career Choices and Company Culture

(42:12) Online Presence and AI Influence

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Transcript

https://justinpang.com/jae-podcast-transcript

Vivian Sun is the Head of Automated Driving at Amazon and an accomplished autonomous vehicle and AI expert. Vivian previously served as the Chief Commercial Officers at Waabi and the VP of Business Development at TuSimple, two leaders in autonomous trucking. In this episode, Vivian shares more about the current state of the AV industry, the potential of generative AI, and how her upbringing shaped her career path.

Chapters:

(00:01) Autonomous Vehicles

(14:08) Hardware and Software Integration in Self-Driving

(19:03) Future of Self-Driving Trucks in Industry

(24:37) Curiosity, Industry Connections, and Staying Ahead

(30:29) Importance of Deep Conversations and Reflection

(45:20) Self-Growth and Future Plans

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Transcript

https://justinpang.com/vivian-podcast-transcript

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Follow Vivian on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vivian-sun-0a22772a/

Learn more about Amazon's Middle Mile Product: https://www.amazon.science/latest-news/how-amazons-middle-mile-team-helps-packages-make-the-journey-to-your-doorstep

Albert Tai is the Founder and CEO of Hypercare, a VC-backed healthcare technology company that helps connect the right healthcare providers at the righttime to improve patient outcomes in hospitals and community settings. Albert started Hypercare in 2016 when he realized how challenging it was to communicate efficiently in the healthcare space. He hasn’t looked back since then and Hypercare has launched in over 100 organizations across North America from large hospital systems to small community health centers. I had a lot of fun chatting with Albert about his upbringing that saw him move from Canada to Taiwan and back, how he convinced his parents to work in tech, and what advice he has to those trying to figure out what to do with their career.

Timestamps:

(00:01) Tech CEO's Takeaways and Childhood Experiences

(10:10) Early Technology Exposure and Parental Support

(15:12) Career Choices and Starting Software Company

(26:11) Journey of Starting a Healthcare Company

(35:58) The Importance of in-Person Brainstorming

You can follow Albert and his work at Hypercare here:

Transcript: https://justinpang.com/albert-podcast-transcript

Francois (Frankie) Le Nguyen is the CEO and Co-Founder of Staging Labs, a startup that secures crypto and NFT assets by intercepting dangerous transactions in real-time. Frankie previously built and launched startup incubator Entrepreneur First in Canada and served as GM in both its Toronto and Singapore location where he helped build 50+ venture-backed startups valued at over $400M. Frankie started his career in product management at software companies LightSpeed and Holmusk, and is an angel investor on the side.

You can follow Frankie's latest work and thinking at:

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Timestamps:

(00:01) - Halloween, Bitcoin, and Childhood Memories

(08:28) - Asian Immigrant Families and Career Expectations

(15:22) - Frankie's Unconventional Path to Entrepreneurship

(23:28) - From Ambition to Accidental Tech Career

(29:41) - Entrepreneur First

(38:11) - Building Resilience and Creating Connections

(46:11) - Exploring the Journey of Staging Labs

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Transcript:

https://justinpang.com/frankie-podcast-transcript

Jaclyn Ling is the Co-Founder of Hatchways, a Y-Combinator-backed startup that is modernizing the technical interview process for start-ups and developers looking for their next great job. Prior to starting Hatchways, Jaclyn was the co-founder of a fashion bot company Blynk which was acquired by Kik Interactive in 2016. Jaclyn grew up in Vancouver, Canada, studied finance at McGill University, and had her first taste of success as a YouTube fashion influencer that had thousands of followers.

In this episode, you will learn:

How Jaclyn’s love for competitive nature was first sparked as a kid playing board games 

How Jaclyn knew she wanted to be an entrepreneur at a young age

How Jaclyn translated her dislike for interviewing into building Hatchways - a company focused on making interviews better 

You can follow Jaclyn on Twitter and LinkedIn and learn more about Hatchways at hatchways.io

Ivan Zhang is the co-founder and CTO of Cohere, a leading GenAI startup that provides natural language processing models to help developers and companies build new products and unlock business value with language AI. Cohere’s models power interactive chat features, generate text for product descriptions, blog posts, and articles, and capture the meaning of text for search, content moderation, and intent recognition. Cohere recently closed a $270M series C round and is valued at over $2B. 

Prior to co-founding Cohere in 2019,Ivan founded FOR.ai, an independent AI research group and worked in the biotech and MLOps space as a software engineer. Ivan dropped out of his undergrad University of Toronto and he is a proud Torontonian, Chinese immigrant, and League of Legends player.

In this episode, you will learn:

How Ivan first fell in love with computer science in high school

How Ivan made the mental calculation to drop out of university (and convince his parents it was a rational idea)

Where Ivan thinks we are in the GenAI hype cycle and why Cohere is here to stay

About Ivan’s favorite Chinese restaurants in Toronto 

You can follow Ivan on Twitter and learn more about Cohere at www.cohere.com

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(00:01) Tech Trends and Personal Background

(16:55) High School, Computer Science, and Support

(27:26) University, Hackathons, and Career Path

(36:08) Founding a Startup and Building Technology

(47:03) Recruiting Strategies and Cohere's Vision

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Transcript: https://justinpang.com/ivan-podcast-transcript

Thomas Park is a leader in global venture capital and is a Partner at the BDC Deep Tech Fund and the Co-founder of Asian Canadian Ventures Collective. Tom has been at the BDC since 2017 and currently leads a $200M venture capital fund that invests in Canadian startups developing cutting edge technology including quantum computers.

Previously, Tom served 5 years at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and McKinsey & Co., where he had the opportunity to oversee numerous special projects across both the public and private sector. For the first eight years of his career, Tom put his law degree to good use as a consultant to the International Criminal Court (aka The Hague), and at the United Nations Khmer Rouge Tribunal in Cambodia.

Tom is a graduate of Dartmouth College’s Tuck School of Business, Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, and McGill University. He sits on a number of boards at McGill, Ryerson University, and as chair of the Banff Forum. He was recognized for his leadership when he was selected as one of Canada’s Top 40 Under 40 in 2017. In 2022, Tom co-founded the Asian Canadian Venture Collective that helps bring together Canadians of Asian heritage working in tech.

In this episode, you will learn:

You can follow Tom on LinkedIn and learn more about the Asian Canadian Ventures Collective at https://ac-vc.ca/.

Shruthi Rao is the Co-Founder and Chief Business Officer of Vendia, a multi-cloud, distributed data platform. Previously, Shruthi launched Amazon’s managed blockchain business and led business development for various AWS’ services. Shruthi also held a variety of leadership roles in Corporate Development at Bank of America, AT&T, DirectTV and start-up, Feedzai. Shruthi began her career at McKinsey and holds an MBA and Computer Science Degree.

In this episode, you will learn about:

You can learn more about Vendia at https://www.vendia.com/ and Follow Shruthi on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/shruthirao/

Linda Ho is the Chief People Officer at Seismic, an AI-powered sales enablement platform that improves team productivity, collaboration and knowledge sharing. As the Chief People Officer, Linda leads the company’s initiatives around culture, org development, talent acquisition, total rewards and internal communications. Prior to joining Seismic, Linda spent 14 years in various HR leadership roles at Autodesk Inc, most recently as a Vice President, and focused on creating a diverse, equitable, and inclusive work environment.

Linda was named a “Top 50 Women Leaders in SAAS” by the Software Report and has been featured as a thought leader in publications such as Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal. Linda holds a Master of Business Administration from the University of Washington, and a Bachelor of Arts in social ecology from the University of California, Irvine.

In this episode, you will learn about:

You can follow Linda on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/linda-ho-1ba8a21/

Dr. Bodi Zhang is Chief Strategy Officer at Thorne HealthTech (Nasdaq: THRN), a leading healthcare company that utilizes innovative testing and data to deliver personalized solutions for consumers, health professionals, and corporations. Previously, Bodi served as the Chief Science Officer for Onegevity Health, and was a leader at global healthcare consultancy Deallus Group.  As a scientist, Bodi’s research focused on autoimmune diseases and published top-tier research publications. Dr. Zhang holds a Ph.D in Pharmacology and Biochemistry from Tufts University, Boston, an M.P.H in healthcare management from Harvard University and a M.D. from Peking University, China.

In this episode, you will learn:

You can follow Bodi on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/bodi-zhang-2957a022/ and learn more about Thorn HealthTech at https://www.thorne.com/

Eden Full Goh is the CEO and Founder of Mobot, a venture-backed company that automates testing of mobile apps using robotics technology. Previously, Eden built products that spanned the energy, healthcare and government sectors at Palantir Technologies and Butterfly Network. Eden also founded and scaled SunSaluter, a global non-profit that has deployed an open-source solar panel tracker design in 19 countries, impacting 17,000+ people. Eden was part of the inaugural cohort of the prestigious Thiel Fellowship, which provides a $100,000 grant for young people to build world-changing products instead of sit in a classroom. Before receiving a Thiel Fellowship, Eden studied Mechanical Engineering and Computer Science at Princeton University. 

In this episode, you will learn:

You can follow Eden on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/edenfull/and learn more about Mobot at https://www.mobot.io/

Percy Hung is the co-founder and CEO of Choco Up, one of the largest revenue-based financing and growth platforms in Asia that provides funding to fast growing start-ups. Choco Up utilizes data analytics and third party integrations to automate funding decisions and provides companies with growth capital in as little as 48 hours. Prior to starting Choco Up, Percy founded two other ventures and also held various engineering and venture capital roles in the APAC region. Percy was born in Hong Kong, raised in Singapore, and is an alumnus of Georgia Tech where he studied Aerospace Engineering. 

In this episode, you'll learn more about:

You can follow Percy on LinkedIn and learn more about Choco Up at https://choco-up.com/

Amelia Lin is the CEO and Co-Founder of Honeycomb, a private social app for families. Honeycomb offers families a way to curate and share their favorite moments and memories in a private and secure way. Prior to starting Honeycomb, Amelia was previously a product leader at Udacity and Optimizely. Amelia obtained her MBA degree from the Harvard Business School and studied physics during undergrad at Harvard.

In this episode, you’ll learn about:

You can follow Amelia on Twitter at https://twitter.com/linamelia and learn more about Honeycomb and open positions at: joinhoneycomb.com/jobs

Judy Lai-Norling is the COO at Carbon Mapper - an organization developing a new way to locate, quantify and track carbon emissions from air and space. Prior to joining Carbon Mapper, Judy spent 14 years at NASA’s Jet Propulsion lab in both business and engineering roles. Judy holds Master’s Degrees in Math and Economics from the University of Texas and University of Wisconsin respectively.

In this episode:

You can follow Judy on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/judylainorling and learn more about Carbon Mapper at https://carbonmapper.org/

Vivian Shen is the CEO and Co-Founder of Juni Learning - an education platform that helps connect kids to expert mentors to help empower them and learn topics like Coding, Storytelling, and Investing. Prior to starting Juni Learning, Vivian had a variety of experience including being a software engineer at Google, consultant at McKinsey & Company, and product leader at a start-up called Operator. Vivian has been featured in Forbes’ 30 Under 30, Fast Company, TechCrunch, and Fortune. Vivian earned her undergraduate degree from Stanford University where she studied computer science.

In this episode, you will learn more about:

You can follow Vivian on Twitter at https://twitter.com/vivianmshen and learn more about Juni at https://junilearning.com/

Rob Chang is the CEO and Co-Founder of Gryphon Digital Mining, a company focused on sustainable Bitcoin mining. Rob has deep experience in the cryptocurrency space including previously being the CFO at Riot Blockchain where he helped turn around the company during the midst of the last Bitcoin bear market. Prior to working in crypto, Rob had a successful career in capital markets where he led equity research focused on the precious metals and mining industry. Rob obtained both his MBA and undergraduate degree from the University of Toronto.

In this episode, you will learn more about:

You can learn more about Gryphon Digital Mining at https://gryphondigitalmining.com/ and follow Rob on Twitter at https://twitter.com/omnipotent32

Dr. Raj Das Gupta is the COO at Electrovaya, a publicly traded (TSX:EFL) (OTCQB:EFLVF) company that designs, develops and manufactures proprietary Lithium-ion batteries. Raj has been with Electrovaya for over 10 years and has been involved with every aspect of the business from cell manufacturing, engineering activities and business development. Raj is currently responsible for Electrovaya’s overall Technology and Business Development functions.  Raj attended Imperial College in London, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Cambridge, where he received his Doctorate in Materials Science.

In this episode, you will learn about:

Learn more about Electrovaya at https://electrovaya.com/

Faisal Abid is a serial entrepreneur and currently the Chief Technology Officer and Co-Founder at Eirene Cremations, a direct-to-consumer service that helps families plan affordable and high-quality cremation services. Faisal is also currently a Google Developer Expert, CTO at Bitstrapped.com and Instructor at Brainstation. Prior to founding Eirene Cremations, Faisal was the CTO at Zoom.ai where he led engineering including overseeing its machine learning infrastructure. Faisal has also held senior software engineering roles at health-tech platform, League, and e-reader platform Kobo Inc. (acquired by Rakuten).

On this episode, you will learn about:

Learn more about Eirene Cremations at https://eirene.ca/

Follow Faisal on Twitter at https://twitter.com/faisalabid

Lakhveer Singh Jajj and Traci Cheng are the Co-Founders of Moselle, a tech platform that helps small-medium businesses to create stable, sustainable, and scalable supply chains. Lakhveer and Traci launched Moselle just a couple months before the pandemic hit in 2020 and quickly adapted to help SMBs adapt to the surge in e-commerce. 

In this episode, you will learn more about:

Learn more about Moselle at https://www.moselle.io/. You can also find Lakhveer and Traci on LinkedIn.

Lynne Takagaki is the Co-Founder of Welcome Aboard, a start-up that finds the perfect fit between job seekers and companies with strongly aligned missions and cultures. In addition to leading Welcome Aboard with her two co-founders, Lynne is also a business development leader at AnyRoad, an enterprise relationship management platform. She also spent time as a Sales Manager at PepsiCo and a Sales Lead at ContractRoom.

In this episode, you will learn about:

Links:

Danni Pi is the COO at Rowan, a venture-backed health and wellness company re-imagining ear piercing. Prior to joining Rowan, Danni led operations at Uber where she helped grow ridership and reliability of the ride-sharing service in New York and also helped launched UberEATS in several cities. Danni starter her career as a consultant at Oliver Wyman and obtained her MBA from the Harvard Business School and undergraduate degree in economics from Columbia University.

In this episode you will learn about:

Learn more about Rowan at heyrowan.com

Kane Ma is the Co-founder and CTO, at Kamo Digital Solutions a full-service digital agency for start-ups. Prior to founding his company, Kane played junior varsity basketball at the storied University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill which was also former home to NBA legends Michael Jordan, Vince Carter and many others. After playing professional basketball in Asia for two years, Kane started Kamo Digital Solutions with his friend and former teammate Kanayo Obi-Rapu.  Kane received Bachelor's in Computer Science and Economics at UNC and was recently profiled in the Wall Street Journal sharing his personal experience with anti-Asian hate crimes.

In this episode you will learn about:

Just a heads up - you will hear my son in the background near the end of the recording. He was ok and just a bit moody during the podcast recording :) 

Jeanne Lam is the Chief Business Officer at Wattpad, a global app and entertainment company that is used by 90 million people around the world and recently acquired by South Korean Internet giant Naver for $600M.

Jeanne has over 15 years of experience in tech with a focus on high-growth consumer startups. Prior to Wattpad, Jeanne led growth and user acquisition at Shapeways, the world’s largest 3D printing service. She has also worked in ad tech at Yahoo!, led marketing at mobile payments company GoPago in San Francisco, and spent three years as a management consultant at Accenture.

Jeanne is a board advisor for Women and Color, and serves on her alumni boards in Toronto. She has an M.B.A. from the Harvard Business School and a B.S. in economics from Cornell University, and is passionate about helping young professionals find fulfillment in their careers.

This episode was recorded in the summer of 2020 as part of an Asian Googler Network event I hosted, but it was such an inspiring talk that I wanted to share this with more people. Jeanne kindly agreed that I could publish this talk so here it is - I hope you enjoy it and walk away energized and inspired like I did.

Learn more about Wattpad at https://www.wattpad.com/.

Andrew Chang is the COO of Paxos, a fintech company that builds infrastructure on blockchain to facilitate the movement between physical and digital assets such as cryptocurrency. Before joining Paxos, Andrew had an array of experience including working in business development at Google, serving as COO of video technology company ConditionOne, and starting his career at Morgan Stanley. Andrew earned his MBA from New York University’s Leonard N. Stern School of Business where he was President of the Student body and a BS from Boston College

In this episode, I chat with Andrew about how to figure out what to do with your career, the importance of distinguishing between security and prosperity, and why being a COO is like being a decathlete.

Learn more about Paxos at www.paxos.com

Follow Andrew on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrandrewchang/

Raphael Chow is the CEO and Co-Founder at Wevat, a platform that helps travelers get tax refunds on purchases made in the UK. To date, Wevat has helped travellers from 88 countries get tax refunds on purchases amounting to more than £16 million.

In this episode, you will learn about how Raphael’s upbringing in Asia and Canada shaped his worldview, how he made the transition from studying biochemistry at Oxford to working as a consultant, and the lessons he has learned from building a start-up over the last four years.

Learn more about Wevat at: https://www.wevat.com/

Dr. Paul Bhatti is CEO and Founder at Sowingo -  a cloud-based eCommerce and inventory management solution for dentists. Founded in 2012, Sowingo's mission is to transform healthcare by offering dental and medical professionals with tools to more efficiently run their practices and improve patient outcomes. The company helps save dentists time and money through their robust marketplace that carries over 50,000 products from the best suppliers in the industry. 

In addition to running Sowingo, Dr. Bhatti is an oral and maxillofacial surgeon with over 15 years of experience in the United States and Canada. In this episode, you will learn about Dr. Bhatti's beginnings as a 6 year old immigrant taking ESL classes, how his father shaped his desire to devote his career to healthcare, and why he is taking more risk now than ever.

You can learn more about Sowingo at: https://sowingo.com/

You can find Dr. Paul Bhatti on LinkedIn at  https://www.linkedin.com/in/paul-bhatti-51289966/

Qiaojia Li is the CEO and Co-Founder at Rosecut - a wealth management platform to help you access the knowledge and advice you need to plan for the future you want. Prior to starting Rosecut, Qiaojia was a private wealth manager at Credit Suisse and Coutts in London. She started her career in Mergers & Acquisitions in Asia and earned her MBA at the London Business School (where we were classmates!).

In this episode, you will learn about how Qiaojia's mother's life as an entrepreneur inspired her to create Rosecut, how her company democratizes financial planning tools previously only available to the super rich, and her advice for those considering an MBA.

Learn more about Rosecut at https://rosecut.com/

Lyn Chen is the Co-founder and COO at LayerCI: a Y Combinator backed platform that helps developers review and publish code faster and better. Prior to co-founding LayerCI, Lyn was the co-founder and CEO of a food tech company, Candy Cutlery. In the episode, I chat with Lyn about her passion for power lifting, what her experience as an entrepreneur taught her about mental health, and why finding a co-founder is like dating. Happy listening and thank you, Lyn, for joining!

Links:

Professor Ellen Wu is the Associate Professor in the Department of History at Indiana University Bloomington and Director of the Asian American Studies Program. She is the author of the book “The Color of Success: Asian Americans and the Origins of the Model Minority”.Her commentary has been featured by a number of outlets including the Los Angeles Times, Washington Post and NPR. Professor Wu obtained a PhD in History from the University of Chicago, and an M.A. at UCLA.

I really enjoyed this conversation with Professor Wu and I highly recommend you read her book, The Color of Success. In the book, Professor Wu does a superb job of weaving together the complex and changing attitudes towards Asian immigrants in the United States from the 1800s when Asians were outcasts of society to the mid-20th century when they were labelled the “model minority”.

In this episode you will learn about:

Especially in light of all the social injustice that is happening in the world right now, I believe it is more important that ever to better appreciate the arc of Asian Americans in history to recognize our privilege and be emboldened to bring more equality in the world.

Follow Professor Wu on Twitter: @ellendwu

Buy Professor Wu's book, The Color of Success at your favorite bookstore: https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691168029/the-color-of-success

Jiaqi Pan is the CEO and Founder of Landbot - a no-code chatbot platform that empowers businesses to acquire, engage and monetize customers in messaging channels. Landbot has over 50,000 customers including Uber, L’Oreal and LG. Prior to founding Landbot in 2017, JIA-CHEE was the CEO and founder of Helloumi - a B2C messaging platform for businesses to engage with their customers. In this episode, I chat with Jiaqi about his journey from China to Spain when he was young, how Iron Man and Robert Kiyosaki inspired his career path, and why being Chinese in Spain has its advantages.

Buck Gee is a pioneer in helping to improve Asian representation in business and technology.  

Buck retired in 2008 from Cisco Systems, where he was Vice President and General Manager of the Data Center Business Unit. He joined Cisco with its 2004 acquisition of Andiamo Systems where Mr. Gee was President and CEO. In 2010, he co-founded the Advanced Leadership Program for Asian American Executives, an executive education program at the Stanford Graduate School of Business; and he is also a co-founder of the Corporate Executive Initiative, a national network of Asian American executives. 

He teaches executive leadership workshops for Ascend, a pan-Asian professional organization. He is a board member of the Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation and co-chair of the Donor Advisory Board of Silicon Valley Community Foundation. Mr. Gee is a co-founding board member of the Chinese American Community Foundation and serves on the board of Ascend/Northern California, the advisory board of the Asia Society/Northern California, and the advisory board of the Asian Pacific American Leadership Institute. 

Previously, he held management positions in engineering, marketing, and business development at Hewlett Packard, National Semiconductor, 3Com, Crescendo Communications, Com21, and Iospan Wireless. He has also taught computer and electrical engineering courses at Stanford University and Howard University. He holds BS and MS degrees in electrical engineering from Stanford University and an MBA from the Harvard Business School. 

On this episode, I chat with Buck about how his upbringing as one of the few Asians in his community shaped his life, the one thing that has motivated him throughout his career, and the top skill that Asians need to develop to be more successful in their career. 

If you are interested in learning more about Buck's pioneering work be sure to check out: 

Dr. Joseph Choi is the Co-Founder and COO of Hypercare - a platform for clinicians to securely communicate and locate each other quickly and effectively. Dr. Choi is also an Emergency Physician in Toronto and an Assistant Professor at the University of Toronto's medical school. Dr. Choi earned his Master of Public Health at Harvard and earned his MD at the University of Toronto. In this episode, I chat with Dr. Choi about what he's seeing in the field regarding COVID-19, how technology is helping solve today's healthcare problems, and how his curiosity as a child led him to pursue a career in medicine. Also, since I was recording this from home you may hear my two kids in the background :)

Hanmin Yang is the CEO and Founder of Alike - a dating app for the modern North American Asian that celebrates our identity, culture and story as told by us.  On this episode of Asian Tech Leaders, I chat with Hanmin about his upbringing as a Korean immigrant to Canada, how his background in film helps him in creating a tech product, and the importance of mental health as an entrepreneur. 

Mikael Cho is the Co-Founder and CEO of Unsplash, a crowd-sourced photo service platform with over 300 million users and over 1 million free high-resolution photos.  Founded in 2013 as a humble Tumblr blog, Unsplash has grown into an industry-leading visual community. It’s become a source of inspiration for everyone from award-winning writers like Deepak Chopra to industry-titans like Apple, and millions of creators worldwide. On this episode I chat with Mikael about growing up in a small town in Wisconsin, how career shadowing in college helped him figure out what to do with his career, and what it is like to co-found a company with your significant other. Hope you enjoy this episode and this wraps up our last podcast of 2019 - see you in 2020 :) 

Links:

Donna Litt is the Co-founder and COO at Kiite, a B2B AI platform that serves as an intelligent sales coach. Before Kiite, Litt co-founded TribeHR, which was acquired by NetSuite in 2013. On this episode, I chat with Donna about her experience growing up in a mixed race household, how her background in archaeology led to a career in technology, and what drove her to writing and publishing her first novel in 2018 called 'Where the Sun Sets'. 

Links:

Rain Takahashi is the CEO and Founder of JAUNTIN', an A.I.-backed on-demand insurance platform that makes obtaining insurance quick and easy. https://jauntin.com

Emma Yang is the fifteen-year-old Founder of Timeless, a mobile app that helps Alzheimer’s patients stay engaged and connected to loved ones. In September 2017, Timeless was selected as the winner of the MIT Solve Brain Health Challenge and designated as one of the 38 Solvers out of nearly 1,000 solutions from 103 countries. Most recently, Emma was named the Grand Prize Winner of the Women Startup Challenge hosted by Women Who Tech and Google. On this episode, I chat with Emma about challenges she faced raising money as a 13-year-old, the influence of her parents and her transition from Hong Kong to New York. Enjoy!

Jimmy Chen is the CEO and founder of Propel, a software company that aims to make America’s safety net more user friendly. Prior to Propel, Jimmy graduated from Stanford University with a degree in Symbolic Systems, and worked as a Product Manager at LinkedIn and Facebook.  On this episode, I talk with Jimmy about his childhood as a Chinese immigrant in Kansas City, how he decided to start his own company, and advice on how to find your passion. 

Sobhan Etemadi is the CEO and Founder of Sobie Systems, a Canadian-based startup that builds smart-product solutions using advanced sensor technologies for monitoring of residential HVAC systems. Sobie Systems’ current product, Everest, monitors the energy efficiency and performance of the HVAC system in real-time and prevents homeowners from exposure to deadly carbon monoxide leaks. Prior to starting Sobie Systems, Sobhan worked at aerospace leader Pratt & Whitney, and transportation manufacturer Bombardier. Sobhan holds a PhD in Aerospace Engineering from Ryerson University and was also selected to join the prestigious Next 36 accelerator program in Canada.

On this episode I talk to Sobhan about his upbringing as an immigrant from Iran, how his parents shaped his career journey, and his love for the outdoors and rock climbing. 

Hope you enjoy the episode and feel free to follow Sobhan on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sobhanetemadi/

Xiao Wang is the co-founder and CEO of Boundless, helping families navigate the complex legal immigration system more confidently, rapidly, and affordably than ever before. Prior to Boundless, he held leadership roles at Amazon Go, Providence Equity, NYC Department of Education, and McKinsey. Xiao holds a BA/MS from Stanford University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

On this episode, we hear from Xiao about his upbringing as a Chinese immigrant raised in the suburbs of Seattle, how training for endurance races has made him a better founder and executive, and advice he has on how to find your passion. 

Learn more about Boundless at: https://boundless.com

Follow Xiao on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/xiaowang1/

Recommended books written by Brad Feld: https://www.amazon.com/Brad-Feld/e/B0043MYSL8