Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders (ETL)

Ellen Ochoa (NASA) - Leadership Lessons from Space

Ellen Ochoa is the first Hispanic woman astronaut to go into space, serving on four space shuttle missions. She served from 2013 to 2018 as the first Hispanic director and the second female director of Johnson Space Center. She earned her MS in electrical engineering and her PhD in electrical engineering with a focus in optical information processing from Stanford. In this conversation with Adjunct Lecturer Emily Ma, Ochoa shares insights she learned in space and on Earth about exploration, resilience, purpose, and teamwork. Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders is produced by the Stanford Technology Ventures Program (STVP), the entrepreneurship center at the Stanford School of Engineering, and published on eCorner by STVP. STVP empowers aspiring entrepreneurs to become global citizens who create and scale responsible innovations. CONNECT WITH US YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/ecorner [https://www.youtube.com/user/ecorner]   X: https://x.com/ECorner [https://x.com/ECorner]   LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/stanfordtechnologyventuresprogram/ [https://www.linkedin.com/company/stanfordtechnologyventuresprogram/]   Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/stanfordstvp.bsky.social [https://bsky.app/profile/stanfordstvp.bsky.social]  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/StanfordTechnologyVenturesProgram [https://www.facebook.com/StanfordTechnologyVenturesProgram]  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stanford_stvp [https://www.instagram.com/stanford_stvp/]    LEARN MORE STVP: https://stvp.stanford.edu/ [https://stvp.stanford.edu/]  eCorner by STVP: https://stvp.stanford.edu/ecorner [https://stvp.stanford.edu/ecorner]  Support our mission of providing students and educators around the world with free access to Stanford University’s network of entrepreneurial thought leaders: https://stvp.stanford.edu/giving-to-stvp/ [https://stvp.stanford.edu/giving-to-stvp/].

Elizabeth Weil (Scribble Ventures) - A People-Centered Journey

Elizabeth Weil is the founder and general partner at Scribble Ventures, the seed fund where builders from OpenAI, Meta, Twitter, Instagram, and a16z channel their operator DNA into backing the next generation of AI‑native companies. In this conversation with Adjunct Lecturer Emily Ma, Weil shares the life lessons she’s learned over her career as an operator and investor, emphasizing the importance of connecting with others and planning activities for yourself outside of work. Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders is produced by the Stanford Technology Ventures Program (STVP), the entrepreneurship center at the Stanford School of Engineering, and published on eCorner by STVP. STVP empowers aspiring entrepreneurs to become global citizens who create and scale responsible innovations. CONNECT WITH US YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/ecorner [https://www.youtube.com/user/ecorner]   X: https://x.com/ECorner [https://x.com/ECorner]   LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/stanfordtechnologyventuresprogram/ [https://www.linkedin.com/company/stanfordtechnologyventuresprogram/]   Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/stanfordstvp.bsky.social [https://bsky.app/profile/stanfordstvp.bsky.social]  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/StanfordTechnologyVenturesProgram [https://www.facebook.com/StanfordTechnologyVenturesProgram]  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stanford_stvp [https://www.instagram.com/stanford_stvp/]    LEARN MORE STVP: https://stvp.stanford.edu/ [https://stvp.stanford.edu/]  eCorner by STVP: https://stvp.stanford.edu/ecorner [https://stvp.stanford.edu/ecorner]  Support our mission of providing students and educators around the world with free access to Stanford University’s network of entrepreneurial thought leaders: https://stvp.stanford.edu/giving-to-stvp/ [https://stvp.stanford.edu/giving-to-stvp/].

Tracy Chou (Block Party) - Founding a Mission-Driven Startup

Tracy Chou is a product-minded engineering leader and exited founder with more than 15 years of experience building and scaling consumer and enterprise products. She is best known for her work advocating for diversity and inclusion in tech, and for being founder and CEO of Block Party, a platform for online safety, privacy, and anti-harassment, which was recently acquired by DeleteMe. In this conversation with Adjunct Lecturer Emily Ma, Chou explains how her early experiences working at tech startups inspired her to found a mission-driven company and how Block Party balanced mission and profitability. Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders is produced by the Stanford Technology Ventures Program (STVP), the entrepreneurship center at the Stanford School of Engineering, and published on eCorner by STVP. STVP empowers aspiring entrepreneurs to become global citizens who create and scale responsible innovations. CONNECT WITH US YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/ecorner [https://www.youtube.com/user/ecorner]   X: https://x.com/ECorner [https://x.com/ECorner]   LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/stanfordtechnologyventuresprogram/ [https://www.linkedin.com/company/stanfordtechnologyventuresprogram/]   Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/stanfordstvp.bsky.social [https://bsky.app/profile/stanfordstvp.bsky.social]  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/StanfordTechnologyVenturesProgram [https://www.facebook.com/StanfordTechnologyVenturesProgram]  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stanford_stvp [https://www.instagram.com/stanford_stvp/]    LEARN MORE STVP: https://stvp.stanford.edu/ [https://stvp.stanford.edu/]  eCorner by STVP: https://stvp.stanford.edu/ecorner [https://stvp.stanford.edu/ecorner]  Support our mission of providing students and educators around the world with free access to Stanford University’s network of entrepreneurial thought leaders: https://stvp.stanford.edu/giving-to-stvp/ [https://stvp.stanford.edu/giving-to-stvp/].

Harry Tannenbaum (Mill) - Setting the Goal at Delight

Harry Tannenbaum is the co-founder and president of Mill, a technology company combining hardware and AI to reduce waste and recover value from everyday materials, starting with food. Mill’s residential food recycler is now in tens of thousands of homes, creating the foundation for Mill Commercial, which pre-processes and analyzes food waste streams on-site, helping organizations reduce waste, gain operational efficiencies, and unlock new value from what was once discarded. In this conversation with Adjunct Lecturer Emily Ma, Tannenbaum explains his approach to creating products that customers rave about and companies that scale to the point of changing entire systems. Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders is produced by the Stanford Technology Ventures Program (STVP), the entrepreneurship center at the Stanford School of Engineering, and published on eCorner by STVP. STVP empowers aspiring entrepreneurs to become global citizens who create and scale responsible innovations. CONNECT WITH US YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/ecorner [https://www.youtube.com/user/ecorner]   X: https://x.com/ECorner [https://x.com/ECorner]   LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/stanfordtechnologyventuresprogram/ [https://www.linkedin.com/company/stanfordtechnologyventuresprogram/]   Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/stanfordstvp.bsky.social [https://bsky.app/profile/stanfordstvp.bsky.social]  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/StanfordTechnologyVenturesProgram [https://www.facebook.com/StanfordTechnologyVenturesProgram]  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stanford_stvp [https://www.instagram.com/stanford_stvp/]    LEARN MORE STVP: https://stvp.stanford.edu/ [https://stvp.stanford.edu/]  eCorner by STVP: https://stvp.stanford.edu/ecorner [https://stvp.stanford.edu/ecorner]  Support our mission of providing students and educators around the world with free access to Stanford University’s network of entrepreneurial thought leaders: https://stvp.stanford.edu/giving-to-stvp/ [https://stvp.stanford.edu/giving-to-stvp/].

Kit Rodgers, Ben Jun, and Paul Kocher (Cryptography Research, Inc.) - Complementary Co-Founders in Cryptography

Stanford alumni Kit Rodgers, Paul Kocher, and Ben Jun co-founded Cryptography Research, Inc. (CRI), where they built and deployed some of the world’s most impactful security technologies. CRI was acquired by Rambus in 2011 for $342 million. Kocher is a cryptography and data security researcher best known as a co-author of the SSL 3.0/TLS 1.0 protocols. Jun is an engineer who most recently served as the vice president of livestream and video at Diamond Kinetics, which acquired his company sidelineHD, a livestreaming platform for sports. Rodgers is the senior vice president of technology partnerships and corporate development at Rambus. In this conversation, Kocher, Jun, and Rodgers discuss how CRI’s business model evolved and how they built their uncommon level of trust in each other throughout the process. Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders is produced by the Stanford Technology Ventures Program (STVP), the entrepreneurship center at the Stanford School of Engineering, and published on eCorner by STVP. STVP empowers aspiring entrepreneurs to become global citizens who create and scale responsible innovations. CONNECT WITH US YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/ecorner [https://www.youtube.com/user/ecorner]   X: https://x.com/ECorner [https://x.com/ECorner]   LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/stanfordtechnologyventuresprogram/ [https://www.linkedin.com/company/stanfordtechnologyventuresprogram/]   Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/stanfordstvp.bsky.social [https://bsky.app/profile/stanfordstvp.bsky.social]  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/StanfordTechnologyVenturesProgram [https://www.facebook.com/StanfordTechnologyVenturesProgram]  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stanford_stvp [https://www.instagram.com/stanford_stvp/]    LEARN MORE STVP: https://stvp.stanford.edu/ [https://stvp.stanford.edu/]  eCorner by STVP: https://stvp.stanford.edu/ecorner [https://stvp.stanford.edu/ecorner]  Support our mission of providing students and educators around the world with free access to Stanford University’s network of entrepreneurial thought leaders: https://stvp.stanford.edu/giving-to-stvp/ [https://stvp.stanford.edu/giving-to-stvp/].