My name is Kanyi Maqubela. I was born in Soweto, a township outside of Johannesburg, South Africa, during apartheid. We came to the United States as refugees, and I grew up in New England, attending Phillips Academy. I did undergraduate and graduate (2x drop-out) studies at Stanford University, where my major was in Philosophy, and studied all sorts of things, most notably computer science, chemistry, physics, and mathematics. I have taught elementary and middle school math and science. Working on Barack Obama's 2008 election campaign is, to date, the most meaningful and difficult work I've ever done. I enjoyed being on the teaching team for Design Your Life, a class for undergraduates out of the Stanford Design Program. I more recently loved teaching undergraduate students at NYU's Tisch School of the Arts. For my first job, I served on the initial team at Doostang, an online career community which was acquired by Universum Global. I was also part of the team at One Block Off The Grid, an internet-based solar sales business. 1BOG was acquired by Pure Energies Group (now $NRG). Over the years, I've consulted with a South African private equity firm, a small-car company, the designers behind the mouse, produced a documentary film, and helped grow a new venture capital firm. Most recently, I teamed up with an old friend to launch a company to change how heart health is delivered across the world. I serve on the board of the endowment for the health system that trained my spouse and takes care of my family. Most of my internet activity can be found on Twitter lately.

I am now building a firm called Kindred Ventures, where we are taking the earliest, biggest risk on founders who want to use the most cutting edge technology to improve our society, and improve our world.

I try to write as diligently as I can. I believe in God, love my family, and currently spend most days in San Francisco with my wife, son, and daughter.