EVN Disrupt

This week on EVN Disrupt we are launching a new series of podcasts that were recorded with guests and participants of the Science and Technology Convergence Conference that took place on September 28-29, 2022. Our first guest of the series is Dr. Mary Papazian, the former president of San Jose State University. We discussed the evolving role of the university today, and her thoughts on Armenia’s higher education ecosystem.

This week on EVN Disrupt, Marina Aghayan, the co-founder of AIP Tech and Fact Industries, joins us to discuss the potential that 3D printing has for solving real-world problems. AIP Tech is an Armenian company that 3D prints devices for the medical and aerospace industries. AIP Tech volunteered to help veterans of the 2020 Artsakh War with varying bone injuries with customized 3D implants to help them return to normal life.

This week on EVN Disrupt, Stepan Aslanyan, the co-founder and CEO of Hexact, joins us to discuss the problems they are working on solving by building no-code business intelligence tools. We also discussed Stepan’s long business career in Armenia and his thoughts on the country’s business culture.

Zareh Zurabyan, the head of the Americas division at eLabNext, a European biotech company, joins us to discuss problems the biotech industry is currently working to solve. Zareh describes who the different players in biotech ecosystems are and what trends he is seeing in the industry in 2022. We also discussed his efforts to mentor Armenian start-ups and his thoughts on Armenia’s biotech scene.

This week on EVN Disrupt, Karen Vardanyan, a founding partner at FormulaVC, joins us to discuss their firm’s investment strategy and what early stage start-ups they’re seeing in the Armenian ecosystem. We also discussed what the current global economic situation means for Armenian start-ups, and what the future of the venture capital space in Armenia may look like.

This week on EVN Disrupt, Manana Hakobyan, the founder and CEO of DataPoint Armenia, joins us to discuss the importance of data-driven culture, and how her organization is working to accelerate the development of data science in Armenia.

Karen Gyulbudaghyan, the founding partner at Strategic Values Ventures, a strategic advisory firm for global startups, joins us this week to discuss what it takes to build a successful start-up ecosystem. We also spoke about the impact of the Berkeley Skydeck start-up accelerator program, and the Armenian start-ups that have successfully gone through the program.

Aram Kocharyan, the CEO and co-founder of Layerswap, joins us this week to discuss his start-up that optimizes transferring crypto assets from layer-1 to layer-2 networks. Aram shared his journey from a self-taught junior engineer to building a company that has successfully raised investments and closed deals with multi-billion dollar companies. We also discussed a new project that Aram and his colleagues have started to conduct cryptography research in Armenia.

Liana Karapetyan, an associate at SmartGateVC and the director of Hero House Angels, joins us this week to discuss angel investing opportunities in Armenian start-ups. The Hero House Angels program allows individual investors from around the world to be connected with the Armenian start-up ecosystem and make investments. We also discussed Armenia’s ecosystem's trajectory as the number of start-ups in the country grows.

This week on EVN Disrupt, Arek Der-Sarkissian from Hero House Glendale joins us to recap the 2022 Armenia Tech Trip, a program that brings tech professionals from the Diaspora to Armenia to familiarize them with the country’s tech sector. During the program participants visit the offices of Armenia’s leading tech companies and participate in networking events with members of the industry. We also discussed Hero House Glendale, a start-up hub in Southern California.