Introducing the Susa Venture Fellows 2025-2026 Cohort

Venture is evolving.
And the path into venture is evolving with it.

Since launching the Susa Venture Fellows Program five years ago, 43 investors and technologists have joined the Susa family. Alumni have gone on to roles across the ecosystem–joining firms like a16z, Conviction, Cantos VC–as well as founding companies such as Nourish. Each cohort has reinforced our belief that the strongest investors of the next decade will shape venture differently from the last.

Today, we’re excited to announce the 10 fellows joining us for the 2025-2026 Susa Venture Fellows Program.

With an influx of funds deploying in the private markets, it’s clear that capital is becoming homogenous in the market. A $5M bank wire looks the same regardless of the firm that sent it.

What is scarce is judgment.
So is trust, taste, speed, and the ability to be genuinely helpful before money is ever involved.

The emerging managers and firms of tomorrow will not resemble the funds launched during the 2010s. They will be leaner, more hands-on, and deeply embedded in the companies they back. They will deploy early, help founders build, and earn their edge through proximity. They will be deeply embedded in the companies they back and attain a deep understanding of the talent that moves the needle within that organization.

Elad Gil made headlines in The Information by targeting a 1.5B fund–and just a month ago, that target reportedly doubled. Investors like Elad and Nat did not start by raising funds. They began by building companies themselves- shipping products, and earning the trust of other builders. Along the way, they began backing founders–first as angels, then as repeat partners–long before capital became central to their identity. Their advantage was not access to money; it was access to insight and high-trust networks formed in the trenches.

The Susa Venture Fellows Program is designed around this reality. It’s a direct extension of how Susa already operates internally: investing early, working closely with founders, and developing judgment through real responsibility rather than abstraction.

Early talent’s time is often misallocated. High turnover in the industry has de-emphasized apprenticeship, and in practice, many firms have junior people primarily for sourcing or to create leverage for senior partners.

What’s often missing is not access to young talent, but trust. Many firms optimize for short-term leverage rather than long-term development, constraining early-career investors to narrow functions instead of giving them room to grow. At Susa, fellows are encouraged to be owners of the craft, not just contributors to pipeline. We invest deeply in 1:1 mentorship, open up real decision-making, and encourage fellows to explore multiple paths at once to investing, operating, building relationships and community, and developing a point of view or thesis in the world.

When people are given context, responsibility, and the freedom to pursue what they are genuinely curious about, they do not just execute better–they compound faster. That ownership, paired with access to the firm’s network, is what has consistently helped fellows at Susa accelerate their careers and build a durable edge early.

Fellows do not just learn from Susa–they actively shape the firm. Their perspectives sharpen our thinking, challenge assumptions, and improve how we evaluate and support founders. It’s impossible to stagnate when you are surrounded by people who push you to see the world differently.

If you are a founder or investor interested in meeting this year’s fellows, we will be hosting events and gatherings throughout 2026.

Chirag Mahapatra

Chirag is Director of Engineering at Mercor, where he collaborates with leading researchers to advance large language models through high-quality datasets and reinforcement learning environments. His work focuses on structured feedback, evaluation benchmarks, and post-training methodologies. Previously, he founded Blaze (backed by YC, Lightspeed Faction) and led engineering teams at Meta and Airbnb.

Sophia Kianni

Sophia is an Iranian-American entrepreneur. She is the founder of Phia, an AI shopping agent backed by Kleiner Perkins. She hosts The Burnouts, one of the fastest growing female business podcasts. She graduated from Stanford University and is the founder of Climate Cardinals, the world’s largest youth-led climate nonprofit. She is the youngest United Nations advisor in US history.

Hamza Mostafa

Hamza is currently spearheading post-training research at a stealth startup in the agents space. He is currently on leave from UWaterloo studying CS. Previously, he was at OpenAI working on ChatGPT Agent 0 to 1. Before that, interned at Whatnot and Verkada, and exited a startup with his dorm roommates in college. Hamza has built an eclectic network ranging from athletes during his powerlifting competition days to exceptional operators and VCs during his time in the bay over the past year.

Rich Zou

Rich is a 20 y/o based in SF. Born in NYC and raised by a single immigrant mom, he started working young at his mother’s restaurant as a dishwasher, selling snacks and sneakers, and later playing professional League of Legends. He dropped out of Northeastern to pursue startups, previously working with Anne Lee Skates at Parable and now leading growth at Delphi. Outside of work, he hosts poker nights and enjoys exploring restaurants.

Emily Han

Emily is at Stanford studying CS (AI & Systems). She loves design/product building at startups and working on AI infrastructure. In her free time, she loves organizing/participating in hackathons, drawing, and reading. She works at Modal on the inference team and hosts great board game nights!

Daniel Bashir

Daniel is an engineer at OpenAI, where he works on post-deployment safety. He previously worked on ML compilers at AWS and on computer vision at SambaNova Systems. He has spent much of his spare time running an online magazine called The Gradient, where he writes and interviews people about AI and adjacent fields.

Dario Soatto

Dario is a CS & Economics major at Stanford. Previously, he was on Lux Capital’s investment team, and he is currently building AI agents at Context AI. He enjoys building random apps, thinking about technology, working with awesome people, and trying crazy new things.

Chappy Asel

Chappy Asel is a lifelong builder who began coding at twelve, creating one of the world’s top homework apps before joining Apple, where he worked on the teams behind the Vision Pro and early prototypes of Apple Intelligence – each step driven by a passion for building on larger and larger scales. He is the Executive Director of The AI Collective, the world’s largest AI community with 100,000+ members across 100+ global chapters, uniting pioneers at the frontier of human progress. Chappy also serves as a Venture Scout for Madrona Venture Group and Advisor to the CEO of Roam. Outside of tech, he loves reading books and is a competitive natural bodybuilder.

Manoj Soundararajan

Manoj is an Agent Product Manager at Decagon, where he focuses on building intelligent AI agents. Previously, he was an investor at Menlo Ventures, backing early-stage AI and software startups. Before that, he held product and sales roles at MainStreet and founded Covalent Ventures, an angel syndicate that has invested in over 30 startups.

Anaïs Killian

Anaïs studied CS and math at Harvard and enjoys learning about AI and machine learning. This summer, she lived in a hacker house with 10 other interns in SF! Anaïs is deeply passionate about mentorship and education, and she loves learning about venture.

Note: A few fellows may not participate in angel investing based on their company’s policies.