Community, Collisions, & Camaraderie: The 2022 Activate Summit

June 25 was a banner day for the Activate community. For a few jam-packed hours, we reconnected with friends and partners, celebrated the graduating Cohort 2020 fellows, welcomed the incoming 2022 fellows, and marveled at the gorgeous San Francisco Bay from our perch at the Exploratorium. It was our first Activate Summit since 2019 and it included a very special guest. More on that below…

We were honored to welcome Arati Prabhakar, President Biden’s pick to lead the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and serve as his top advisor on science and technology—and a longtime friend of Activate. She and our CEO Ilan Gur discussed the state of science innovation in the U.S. during a riveting on-stage chat. Given Arati’s bona fides—she is the former head of DARPA and NIST, worked in venture capital, and recently launched a startup—Ilan said it best: “There is no better voice to speak to our community.”

A handful of graduating 2020 fellows also shared brief TED-style updates on their startups.

And Andrew Ponec (Cohort 2018) updated the community on Antora Energy’s remarkable progress since he, Justin Briggs (Cohort 2018), and David Bierman (Cohort 2017) co-founded the startup. ”Antora Energy would not exist without Activate,” he said. 

This was also our first Activate Summit since we expanded our reach and impact from Berkeley to Boston, to New York, and to fellows across the country through the Activate Anywhere Community. What a thrill to welcome and introduce our team of stellar managing directors, including our newest: Jill Fuss, a Cohort 2018 fellow who is now back, leading the Activate Berkeley community as managing director!

There was so much to celebrate. Here’s to a safe and fruitful year—until we meet again.