{"id":107788,"date":"2021-05-26T14:52:48","date_gmt":"2021-05-26T18:52:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/?p=107788"},"modified":"2022-10-21T17:07:17","modified_gmt":"2022-10-21T21:07:17","slug":"start-up-stars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/2021\/05\/26\/start-up-stars\/","title":{"rendered":"Start-Up Stars"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two ENG alumni are on Forbes\u2019 <\/em>list of top young entrepreneurs<\/strong><\/h3>\n

By Patrick L. Kennedy<\/strong><\/p>\n

If you\u2019re a frequent flyer, you\u2019ve been there. At the airport, eyes on the big board, monitoring your flight status. Delayed. Delayed. And then: Cancelled.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Saniya Shah (’16). Photo by Mamadi Doumbouya<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Saniya Shah (\u201916) has certainly been there, and she\u2019s hit upon a solution. Shah is the CEO and co-founder of Pilota, a travel tech start-up that uses AI to predict the likelihood of flight dis\u00adruptions and empowers customers to book alternate flights ahead of time. No longer must travelers rely on the say-so of the big airlines.<\/p>\n

The editors at Forbes <\/em><\/a>thought that was a promising develop\u00adment. They named Shah and two colleagues to the leading business magazine\u2019s annual \u201c30 Under 30\u201d feature last fall. Specifically, Pilota appeared in the consumer tech list\u2014one of 20 categories, each fea\u00adturing 30 of America\u2019s top start-ups led by twenty-somethings.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Eduardo Portet (’18). Photo by Mitch Tobias<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

And Shah is not alone as an ENG alum. Eduardo Portet (\u201918) and partner made it into the enterprise tech category with their start-up company, Index<\/a>. Their software allows busy managers with no cod\u00ading experience to quickly build their own business-intelligence (BI) dashboards, turning internal stats into actionable insights. Index is ideal for companies that know they want to be \u201cdata-driven,\u201d but don\u2019t know how to get there.<\/p>\n

Forbes <\/em>billed the latest list of leading young entrepreneurs as \u201ca wake-up call to cynics who think they have seen it all.\u201d The publica\u00adtion winnowed down this honor roll from 14,000 nominees. What are the odds that two of ENG\u2019s own would crack the list? In fact, it\u2019s no fluke. Here are their stories.<\/p>\n

Dancer, traveler, entrepreneur<\/strong><\/p>\n

When Saniya Shah took her first steps toward launching a business, they were dance steps. Growing up in New Hampshire as the daugh\u00adter of Indian immigrants, Shah trained in Indian classical dance for years, eventually completing a Nritya Nipuna\u2014a prestigious capstone dance recital. Shah\u2019s passion for dance planted the seeds for her first start-up.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Saniya Shan (’16)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

That start-up wouldn\u2019t blossom until later, but even in high school, Shah showed leadership qualities and grit. She started a nonprofit, Green Chilies, that won an international environmental award for its work cutting down on electronics waste by repurpos\u00ading bulky old computer monitors as HDTVs for developing coun\u00adtries, including India.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom a young age, I was exposed to what it is to be an entre\u00adpreneur,\u201d says Shah, whose father is the co-founder and CEO of a software company. \u201cMy parents were always so supportive of my interests in STEM and entrepreneurship, so whether in classes or clubs, I gained the confidence and pursued those skills I might need down the line.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shah brought that mindset to Boston University. Though she majored in biomedical engineering, she took on an extra challenge in the form of coding and software engineering courses. \u201cThese were the core computer engineering courses,\u201d says Professor David Casta\u00f1\u00f3n (ECE, SE). \u201cThey were very challenging for non-CE majors,\u201d or even CE majors, he added, \u201cbut Saniya was very ambitious and recognized the need for strong computer skills in her future.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was daunting to be one of the few women in those classes, Shah recalls: \u201cI didn\u2019t fit in with the boys\u2019 club.\u201d At first, she struggled with the material and didn\u2019t feel comfortable participating in class discussions or group projects. Casta\u00f1\u00f3n encouraged her to stick with it. \u201cHe was extremely supportive,\u201d Shah says. \u201cI would go to office hours and sit in the front of the class and speak up, and he made sure I got the support I needed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cShe was a talented student,\u201d recalls Casta\u00f1\u00f3n, who was the department chair then. \u201cShe quickly caught up\u201d and earned high grades.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Another stage altogether<\/strong><\/p>\n

Despite the heavy course load\u2014or perhaps because of it\u2014Shah continued dancing, as part of Chankaar, BU\u2019s Indian fusion dance team. \u201cThat took up a lot of my time,\u201d says Shah, who rose to presi\u00addent of the club. \u201cBut it was a nice break. Engineering can be very intense. With dance, you\u2019d get to use a different part of your brain.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her teammate and fellow executive board member Jyothi Nair (CAS\u201915) remembers how as president, Shah bal\u00adanced \u201cher creative side with the logical.\u201d Moreover, Shah was equally comfortable launching a project and listening to oth\u00aders\u2019 ideas, Nair says. \u201cShe was not just a great leader but also a great team player.\u201d<\/p>\n

After graduation, Shah was work\u00ading in the innovation incubator of healthcare company Optum when a relative asked her to choreograph a dance routine for a wedding reception. Shah tapped Nair for help. The dance proved a hit, more weddings followed, and soon the duo went pro, co-founding Kahaani Event Choreography. They coordinated with families stretched around the globe, teaching steps via video.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe was working closely with clients,\u201d says Nair, \u201ctalking them through from start to finish, making sure they had a great experi\u00adence, that they were being tended to\u201d even in the thick of potentially stressful wedding planning. The attention Shah paid to clients\u2019 feelings as well as their logistical complexities would find a parallel in her next start-up.<\/p>\n

A friend to the traveler<\/strong><\/p>\n

Shah has been a frequent flyer since she was a baby, traveling to India to visit family once a year and adding other destinations for business or leisure. She\u2019s been to 50 countries and speaks four lan\u00adguages. She knows well the trials and travails of travel.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Shah visits Venice.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cDelays are the worst,\u201d Shah says. \u201cAnd they\u2019re just handled so poorly among all parties involved. I think every traveler, the second you say \u2018delay\u2019 or \u2018cancellation,\u2019 can think of a time it caused a lot of rippling effects outside just their travel schedule. It\u2019s almost like an emotional problem as well as a physical one.\u201d<\/p>\n

While earning an MBA at Cornell Tech in New York City, Shah and three classmates founded Pilota with a mission to take some of that worrying out of flying. Their algorithm crunches data across the myriad factors that cause delays\u2014from weather to mechanical issues that cause cascading delays as an aircraft flies several routes throughout a day. The software predicts the risk of a flight disrup\u00adtion and allows customers to automatically book a new flight.<\/p>\n

The goal is to level the playing field, Shah says. \u201cTravelers are very much dependent upon these very large companies. What we try to do is bring some of that power back to the people. To let them know, \u2018Hey, if your airline messes up, we\u2019ll help.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

The company got funding from the accelerator 500 Startups and began selling its service to business travelers and corporate travel managers in 2019.<\/p>\n

Maintaining momentum<\/strong><\/p>\n

Then in spring 2020, the pandemic dealt its blow to the travel industry. Pilota added a new product, a Chrome extension called FlySafe. Users select the safety factors most important to them\u2014 does the airline block middle seats? Require masks? Then as they shop for flights, FlySafe rates each trip according to those criteria.<\/p>\n

Pilota made the extension available to the public for free. (They are building a version for paying corporate clients.) \u201cPeople still need to fly,\u201d says Shah, \u201cwhether it\u2019s for a family emergency\u201d or a work site visit that can\u2019t be done remotely. \u201cIf people need to travel, we want to make sure they have a safe way to do so.\u201d<\/p>\n

FlySafe has helped Pilota maintain its momentum, Shah says, and with COVID-19 vaccinations happening, her team is optimistic that business travel will bounce back, as it has after previous downturns.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe fact that through the pandemic they\u2019ve not only survived but are continuing to make a name for themselves,\u201d says Nair, \u201cis a testament to her leadership and her ideas and her ability to run a team.\u201d\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Business intelligence<\/strong><\/p>\n

Eduardo Portet cut his teeth as a businessman in the Dominican Republic, where he was born and raised. Granted, those were baby teeth: His first venture was selling conch shells he\u2019d found on the beach to neighbors and family.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Pladevall (left) and Portet have been friends since preschool.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

But Portet continued to take business seriously. As teenagers, he and Xavier Pladevall\u2014friends since preschool\u2014started their high school\u2019s chapter of DECA Inc. (formerly the Distributive Education Clubs of America), a youth organization for students interested in business and entrepreneurship. Portet was the chief procurement officer.<\/p>\n

When he came to BU to study electrical and computer engineering, it was only natural that Portet would sign up for ENG\u2019s Technology Innovation Concentration (TIC), a four-course sequence dealing with topics in entrepreneurship, innovation, and technology as a provider of societal impact and value. Professor (ECE, SE) and Associate Dean of Educational Initiatives Thomas Little, who is the program\u2019s coordinator, says, \u201cThe TIC is our most popular concentration and has graduated 50 to 60 concentrators per year since its inception\u201d in 2012.<\/p>\n

Portet says his eyes were opened by TIC guest lecturer Rana K. Gupta, director of faculty entrepreneurship at BU, who talked about his own experiences in startups, venture capital, finance, and healthcare. Until then, Portet says, \u201cI didn\u2019t know you could just start a company and talk to investors and get external capital without a finished product.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Portet got hands-on experience building products in Little\u2019s courses. \u201cThose were some of the best, most fruitful classes I took at BU,\u201d Portet says. \u201cHe gave you the freedom to research, explore, and play around with things that weren\u2019t necessarily in the syllabus.\u201d<\/p>\n

For his part, Little remembers Portet as \u201ca delight to work with.\u201d The professor also sponsored a team of ECE majors including Portet who built a drone-tracking laser for their senior design project, presented at the annual ECE Day event. The team\u2019s goal was to find a way to maintain two-way wireless optical communication with a moving unmanned aerial vehicle. Potential applications would include providing internet access to disaster areas.<\/p>\n

It was a daunting task, recalls Associate Professor of the Practice Alan Pisano, the senior design instructor. \u201cAt the onset, it was not at all certain that the team could solve the problem,\u201d says Pisano. \u201cBut they did! Eduardo designed the part of the tracking algorithm which would find the location of the drone for the precision laser tracking algorithm to then take over. He was an effective member of the team,\u201d which won the ECE Day\u2019s Design Excellence Award.<\/p>\n

The importance of teamwork was one of Portet\u2019s prime takeaways from the project. \u201cIt felt like I was working in a real company,\u201d he says. \u201cEspecially in software engineering, it can be easy to just build a project by yourself. When you start building things together, it becomes harder in some respects,\u201d but by learning to communicate and delegate tasks, Portet says, the end product is better, \u201cand it gets done faster.\u201d<\/p>\n

And through TIC, Portet did<\/em> work in a real company\u2014as an intern at Medidata Solutions, a software company focused on the life sciences. There, Portet got his first experience creating a BI dashboard builder. \u201cMy boss showed me he had like 300 Chrome tabs open at the same time,\u201d Portet says. The chaos cried out for its opposite: a single, central source for vast and varied metrics to be called up in clear visuals.<\/p>\n

Go west, young man<\/strong><\/p>\n

After graduation, Portet moved with his girlfriend to San Francisco, without a plan or a job. That leap of faith was rewarded when the couple was walking around a mall and bumped into Portet\u2019s old friend Pladevall. The latter had attended Columbia University and was at this time working for Facebook, but was ready to jump ship.<\/p>\n

\u201cXavier was already in entrepreneur mode,\u201d Portet says. \u201cHe wanted to start a company.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"
Pladevall (left) and Portet in more recent times.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In short order, Portet and Pladevall joined forces. They pitched concepts at hackathons. Like true entrepreneurs, they hatched ideas that didn\u2019t go anywhere but that contained the seeds for better ideas. \u201cWe iterated through three different products,\u201d Portet says. \u201cYou have to deal with a lot of rejections. That\u2019s a big part of staying determined. A lot of people say no.\u201d<\/p>\n

At one hackathon, they unexpectedly got to meet with and hear feedback from Michael Seibel, CEO of Y Combinator, the high-profile startup accelerator. \u201cIf you had told me three years ago that I\u2019d be talking with the CEO of Y Combinator,\u201d Portet says, \u201cI\u2019d be like, \u2018No way.\u2019 Or at least I\u2019d expect to be in a suit, in a very formal meeting. But he was just chilling around in shorts and sandals.\u201d<\/p>\n

Based on feedback from Seibel and others as the pair refined their product, Portet and Pladevall settled on a \u201cno-code\u201d BI dashboard builder. The mission of their company, Index, is to empower managers without technical training to build dashboards that turn reams of sales figures and other data into insights in the form of graphs, charts, and other readily readable visuals.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re doing it through an intuitive user interface,\u201d says Portet. \u201cOur goal is to make Index a no-brainer,\u201d especially for companies that hope to leverage data but lack the expertise and manpower to do so.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of businesses just don\u2019t track anything,\u201d Portet says. \u201cThey\u2019re very in-the-moment. \u2018Hey, we closed a deal today!\u2019 Instead of, \u2018Okay, we closed a deal today, but we closed three yesterday. What can we do to close three tomorrow? Or more?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Index is in a private beta stage now, in which a limited number of clients\u2014ranging from a barbershop booking platform to hospitality and financial technology startups\u2014can use the software and provide feedback to the developers.<\/p>\n

In October, Index got a $2.6 million seed investment from Y Combinator as well as David Sacks, Slack, and Gradient Venture. The founders have hired two more software engineers, so they can delegate some tasks as they grow the company. They\u2019re seeking to raise another $1 million this year. \u201cI wouldn\u2019t bet against them,\u201d wrote a reporter for TechCrunch<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Finding fame in Forbes<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
Shah pitching Pilota at the Future Travel Experience Startup Hub in 2019.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Those who knew Shah and Portet at ENG were not at all surprised to hear the alumni landed on the Forbes <\/em>list. More may well follow, as the College continues to produce Societal Engineers.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s such a go-getter,\u201d says Nair of Shah. \u201cWhatever it is she decides to do, she puts her all into it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI was impressed,\u201d says Casta\u00f1\u00f3n, \u201cbut not surprised, based on what I observed of her potential at Boston University.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shah herself, on the other hand, was \u201cshocked,\u201d she says. \u201cI don\u2019t have the words to explain how it happened, but I\u2019m very excited about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just surreal,\u201d echoes Portet.<\/p>\n

Little was gratified to hear of his former charge\u2019s success. \u201cThat Eduardo has been identified as a rising star as an entrepreneur is a feather in our cap for the TIC program,\u201d he points out.<\/p>\n

\u201cBU really helped me get where I am today,\u201d says Portet. Not only did he learn teamwork, technical skills, and the entrepreneur mindset, but because Boston itself is rather a startup hotbed, his alma mater can be a conversation starter. \u201cIt\u2019s crazy to see how far the BU community reaches.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, Portet has found that in Silicon Valley, \u201cPeople don\u2019t really care what your past is, as long as you have a good idea and the determination to actually sit down and build it.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for Shah, just as she was encouraged in her tech aspirations by her parents and by professors like Casta\u00f1\u00f3n, she hopes to fortify younger women who harbor startup dreams. She takes any opportunity to give talks to female high school or college students interested in entrepreneurship and believes it\u2019s important for women to support each other.<\/p>\n

And that includes friends like Nair. \u201cBU definitely was a huge part of where I am today,\u201d Shah says. \u201cSome of the people I met there are still some of my closest friends and my biggest supporters and shoulders to lean on and people I can reach out to when things get tough.\u201d<\/p>\n

This story originally appeared in the spring 2021 issue of <\/a><\/em>ENGineer, the Boston University College of Engineering alumni magazine.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Two ENG alumni are on Forbes\u2019 list of top young entrepreneurs By Patrick L. Kennedy If you\u2019re a frequent flyer, you\u2019ve been there. At the airport, eyes on the big board, monitoring your flight status. Delayed. Delayed. And then: Cancelled. Saniya Shah (\u201916) has certainly been there, and she\u2019s hit upon a solution. Shah is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2662,"featured_media":128714,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[236,899,907,910],"tags":[701,702,703,692],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107788"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2662"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=107788"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107788\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":130846,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107788\/revisions\/130846"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/128714"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=107788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=107788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=107788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}