Raghu is the Co-founder and CEO of FalconX, one of the largest and fastest growing digital asset brokerages. He’s an engineer by background and passionate about building products that create value – leading him to become a serial entrepreneur, product leader, active investor, and board advisor to several Silicon Valley startups. Prior to FalconX, Raghu held product leadership roles in Google. He was on Sundar Pichai’s Chrome OS team and led efforts to scale Chromebooks to over $3 billion revenue for Google and its partners. He started his career at Motorola as an engineer in a team that pioneered high definition video transmission over IPstack, laying the technical foundation for many popular video streaming services such as Netflix and Youtube. Raghu holds an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School, M.S. from University of Texas at Dallas specializing in Signal Processing & Machine Learning, and B.Tech. from Vellore Institute of Technology.
startups
Ken Kruszka, Founder/CEO Snapcheck
Ken is a FinTech and Payments pioneer, who holds the distinction of being the first person to send $1 around the world by mobile transfer. In his career, Ken has launched: the first mobile remittances service in the US, the first global mobile bank account, the first neobank for immigrants in the US, and the first decoupled business payments smart switch. Currently, Ken leads SnapCheck in revolutionizing business-to-business payments: eliminating $50 Billion in costs, removing $20 Billion in fraud. Previously, as co-founder and CEO of m-Via, Ken grew the company into an industry-recognized leader in mobile financial services and brought the company to cash-flow positive before leading m-Via through an acquisition by Boom Financial. Ken is a Founding Member of the Faster Payments Council, as well as a member of the Federal Reserve’s Business Payments Coalition and the FedNow Community. Ken has been named a Top Innovator to Watch by Bank Innovation, a Top FinTech Innovator by Aspioneer, a Top 25 FinTech CEO by Technology Innovators, and a Leading Corporate Digital Transformation Innovator by Databird.
Alexandre Lazarow, Global Venture Investor Cathay Innovation
Alexandre Lazarow is a global venture capitalist and the author of Out-Innovate: How Global Entrepreneurs – from Delhi to Detroit – Are Rewriting the Rules of Silicon Valley (Harvard Business Review Press). He has invested in startups including Chime, Kin, Neon, Sidecar Health, Facily, FinAccel, ZenBusiness, Kueski, Guiabolso, Zola, Rensource, Terminal, among others. He is a Partner with Cathay Innovation, a Paris-based firm that invests across Africa, Asia, Europe, and North America. Alex is also an adjunct professor specializing in social impact investment and entrepreneurship at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey.
Vivek Krishnamurthy, Investor Commerce Ventures
Vivek is a Principal at Commerce Ventures, an early stage fintech, insurtech and retailtech focused fund based in SF. The Fund’s investments include companies like Bill.com, Marqeta, Forter, Socure, MX, Moov and +80 others. His investment focus includes vertical FinTech platforms, core fintech enablers and insurance data & tech platforms. Prior to Commerce Ventures, Vivek was part of the investment banking team at Financial Technology Partners where he worked on M&A and private placement transactions for numerous growth and late stage FinTechs.