Ekta Dang

Dr. Ekta Dang is the Founder and CEO of U First Capital and drove venture capital investments at Intel prior to that. She has an excellent track record of achieving at least 1 Exit every year: Pensando (Acquired by AMD in 2022), Nextdoor (IPO 2021), Palantir (IPO 2020), Orb Intelligence (Acquired by Dun and Bradstreet in 2020), Pinterest (IPO 2019), Docusign (IPO 2018), etc. She has invested in category-leading companies such as SpaceX, Uniphore, Pensando, Nile (company co-founded by ex-Chairman of Cisco John Chambers with ex CDO of Cisco) and DevRev. Dr. Dang is a member of Congressman Ro Khanna’s Leadership Circle and advises him on technology policy. She was an Advisor to the Chancellor of the University of California San Diego and has been on the Science Translation and Innovative Research (STAIR) Grant Committee of the University of California Davis. She is also an Advisor to Israel’s Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. She is a Contributing Writer for Venture Beat. She has been a successful Venture Capital Investor, Corporate Executive, Speaker, and Writer in Silicon Valley for two decades. At Intel, she has solid experience both in Venture Capital and on the operating side. She brings a stellar network from the Venture Capital and Corporate world to the startups. She has been a mentor at Alchemist Accelerator, Stanford, UC Berkeley, Google Launchpad, etc. She is an invited Speaker at several top Venture Capital/Startup conferences, like TiECon, Silicon Valley Open Doors, etc. She has also co-chaired TiECon’s entrepreneurship track. She has a Ph.D. in Physics (Electronics) and has attended UC Berkeley Haas School's Venture Capital Executive Program. She has published several research papers in IEEE and other reputed international journals. She has recently completed a Wharton program on Board Governance as well.