Life Extension Ventures

Team

Amol and Inaki are both scientists turned serial tech entrepreneurs.

We are a rare breed. As tech entreprepreneurs, former scientists, fundraisers, global operators, M&A dealmakers, and CEOs, we can relate to most other entrepreneurs. Founders call us when they have a complex CEO decision.

Inaki Berenguer, PhD

A Scientist turned

3x Tech Entrepreneur

Master MIT

Master and PhD Cambridge

Inaki Berenguer, PhD

A Scientist turned

3x Tech Entrepreneur

Master MIT

Master and PhD Cambridge

Inaki has been a 3x CEO/entrepreneur in NYC: Pixable, acquired by SingTel in 2012 for $30M; Contactive, acquired by Fuze; and CoverWallet, which raised $60M, with over 500 employees and close to $1B in premium revenue, and acquired by Aon in 2020. He has worked at McKinsey & Company and Microsoft Corporate Strategy. He is a Crown Fellow of the Aspen Institute and has personally invested in over 100 startups, cofounding Agentero and iPronics. He is a 14x marathon finisher (7x NYC).

Inaki earned Master and PhD degrees in Engineering from the University of Cambridge, and an MBA from MIT. He was also a two-year Fulbright Scholar at Columbia University and a postdoc at the Cambridge-MIT Institute.

Amol Sarva, PhD

A Cognitive Scientist

turned 6x Entrepreneur

BA Columbia, PhD Stanford

Amol Sarva, PhD

A Cognitive Scientist

turned 6x Entrepreneur

BA Columbia, PhD Stanford

Amol co-founded several startups including Virgin Mobile USA (raised $550M, IPO 2007), Peek (raised $12M), Halo Neuroscience (raised $10M), Knotable, and Knotel (raised $350M). He has also worked at McKinsey and is a Global Vanguard at the World Economic Forum. He has personally invested in over 50 startups. He studied cognitive science for his PhD at Stanford University and holds an undergraduate degree from Columbia University, where he also teaches.

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Amalia Formoso

CFO

Investment banking

Private equity

Amalia Formoso

CFO

Investment banking

Private equity

Amalia has built a global business experience working as an advisor, investor, fundraiser and CFO to a wide range of companies.

She began her financial career at Lehman Brothers in New York and later joined the M&A team at Arcano (Madrid) and HSBC (London). Later she worked for ICG, where she led the fundraise of over $2bn and invested in primary, secondary and co-investments in US, Europe and Asia. Most recently, Amalia was the CFO of a sustainable tech startup in China.

Trustee to GIST Cancer UK and professor at various programs at the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Amalia holds a BS in International Business from ICADE and Northeastern University with an Erasmus at ESSEC.

Rika Christanto

3x tech operator & entrepreneur

BA and MBA Harvard

Rika Christanto

3x tech operator & entrepreneur

BA and MBA Harvard

Rika Christanto is a Partner at LifeX Ventures.

She has been the Chief Operating Officer of AI healthtech company Idoven, where they raised $20M from Insight Partners and Northzone. She previously spent 5 years as Chief Operating Officer and co-founder of climate-tech startup Ontruck, helping raise $60M from Atomico and Cathay Innovation. As an investor, she has done seed and pre-seed investments for Accel.

Previously, she spent 4 years as a strategy consultant at McKinsey & Company in New York and London, and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in Uganda. She also spent 3 years as a technology investment banker at Morgan Stanley, working on internet (Alibaba, Perfect World, Netease) and climate (Yingli, Trina Solar) deals.

She holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and a Bachelor’s degree from Harvard University (magna cum laude). She has triplets.

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Yue Zhao

CTO&CPO, entrepreneur

BA Berkeley, MBA Harvard

Yue Zhao

CTO&CPO, entrepreneur

BA Berkeley, MBA Harvard

Yue Zhao is a Venture Partner at LifeX Ventures.

Yue was the Chief Product & Technology officer at Fuzzy Pet Health, which raised $88M from Greycroft, Matrix Partners, Icon Ventures, and more. She was also the first PM and Head of Professionals at Thumbtack Inc for 5 years, which was valued at $3.2B in 2021 with investment from Sequoia, Tiger Global, Capital G, QIA, and more. Previously, she co-founded a wine e-commerce startup called FirstCrush.

Yue spent 4 years at Meta working on Instagram Feed and Profile, Messenger Web and Desktop, and SMB Advertising.

She started her career as a BA at McKinsey & Company and in Corporate Strategy at Cisco Systems. She is a seasoned career coach and aspiring writer (Her first book is called The Uncommon Executive, due January 2024).

Yue holds a B.S. in Biomedical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Fellows

Andrea Martos Esteban

University of Cambridge

Andrea Martos Esteban

University of Cambridge

Andrea is a Doctoral Researcher at the University of Cambridge where she is completing her PhD in Biochemistry in 2023.

She is the founder and editor of Cambridge Biocapital, a leading weekly newsletter that covers business funding and science news in the British biotech and venture capital ecosystem. Andrea is passionate about building strong communities and supporting biotech founders through Codon65®, a digital product studio she co-founded to develop brand identity and value propositions for life sciences startups.

Michael Lee

Harvard University

Michael Lee

Harvard University

Michael is a second year MBA student at Harvard Business School, as Co-President of the MS/MBA Life Sciences joint degree program with Harvard's Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and Harvard Medical School.

At Harvard, he is Director of Community & DEI of Nucleate, the biotech accelerator and largest global community of bio-innovators. Before Harvard, he was a Project Manager and Scientist at Roche Diagnostics, Shape Therapeutics, and Stratos Genomics. He’s interested in all things life science, particularly in the convergence of technology and healthcare/biotechnology. He is currently working on a new venture as part of HBS's Rock Accelerator at the intersection of education, data-science, and life science.

Zhun Che

Harvard University

Zhun Che

Harvard University

Zhun is a second year MBA student at Harvard Business School.

Zhun is the President of the HBS Sustainability Club, the Food, Agriculture & Water Club and Co-President/CFO of the VC/PE Club. Prior to HBS, Zhun was a strategy consultant specialised in food and agriculture in New York. He recently completed the Nucleate accelerator program, where he founded a company focused on enzyme development and delivery. Outside of HBS, he is an active board member of Green Hill Food Co-op in Brooklyn - aiming to help transform the local Brooklyn food system by providing healthy, local, and affordable food. He is excited about investing, supporting, and working with companies transforming the energy and food system, as well as other climate-tech.

Krish Mehta

Stanford University

Krish Mehta

Stanford University

Krish is a current Stanford GSB MBA/Master of Science joint degree student focused on Climate, and a Knight-Hennessy scholar.

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Krish was an Engagement Manager at McKinsey & Company in the sustainability practice, supporting companies to decarbonize operations. He later joined Tesla where he managed finance for Tesla Model 3 in the US and Europe.

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Krish earned his Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Pennsylvania focused on renewable energy and in Economics and Statistics from Wharton.

Dennis Michael Kamara

MIT

Dennis Michael Kamara

MIT

Dennis is a second-year MBA Candidate at MIT Sloan, focused on Finance and Sustainability.

At MIT, he is embedded within the entrepreneurial ecosystem, having served as Program Manager at the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship. Prior to MIT, Dennis managed end-to-end execution of the social impact accelerator at Techstars, the world's most active pre-seed investor and accelerator program, and drove commercial efforts at venture-backed edtech startup, Legends of Learning.

Alba Rubio

Stanford University

Alba Rubio

Stanford University

Alba is an MBA candidate at Stanford Graduate School of Business and co-president of the Entrepreneurship Club.

Prior to Stanford, she gained 10+ years of experience in the areas of investments and strategy consulting in roles at the Middle Eastern ride-sharing unicorn Careem (acquired by Uber), KKR Capstone, the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund, and The Economist. Alba was a management consultant at the Boston Consulting Group in Spain and a finance analyst at Bank of America Merrill Lynch in London and Hong Kong. She is committed to investing and forging partnerships with companies to reshape our biopharma and healthcare landscape.

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