This award seeks individuals actively promoting AAPI causes, either through supplier diversity initiatives or in broader DEI efforts. If you or someone you know is championing DEI in the corporate sector, we encourage you to submit a nomination.
Criteria:
Deepti Dawar is an entrepreneur, angel investor and a champion for women. In her current role as Partner & Co-Founder of Major Market Broadcasting – a boutique multicultural Television group, Deepti is responsible for keeping over 72 TV channels on-air 24/7 across the nation.
Prior to co-founding Major Market Broadcasting with her now husband, Deepti was an award-winning designer with her work featured in Vogue & In-Style magazines. After a decade of design & management experience under her belt, she pursued her interest in technology and has consulted as a technical advisor to publicly traded, television & broadband conglomerates in the US & in China.
In addition to serving as Co-President of US Pan Asian American Chamber of Commerce, for the Western region & is Deepti is also an angel investor & Founding Limited Partner at Neythri Futures Fund, a springboard for South Asian women to come together, deploy capital and share their expertise.
Deepti is fluent in 4 languages, conversant in 6 and spent parts of her career living in India and China.
Sandhya Mukkamala is a Partner and Co-Founder at ASTUTE and an accomplished CPA in the State of California. She advises clients on R&D tax incentives, technical accounting, forensic audits, as well as works closely with clients’ CFOs/Controllers to develop stronger processes and controls within the business. She has more than 15 years of experience in audit and review engagements, and complex Merger & Acquisition due diligence audits for private and public accounting sectors.
Prior to founding Astute, Sandhya has served as M&A due diligence auditor for several years in a reputed public accounting firm in Silicon Valley. She has led the audit team in planning, structuring, and performed M&A due diligence activities across all functional areas such as financial, products, operations, and technology etc. She has also served as an external Auditor for various high-tech, automotive, retail, manufacturing, and service industries nationally and globally. As an acumen auditor, she helped companies uncover millions of dollars lost due to fraudulent activities or lack of control over processes, addressed complex accounting and financial reporting challenges.
Besides Auditing and Corporate finance, Sandhya has extensive experience in R&D tax credit consulting projects, performed numerous financial and M&A due diligence audits, resolved complex Accounting for Income tax provisions, SEC Reporting, internal controls testing and fraud testing over financial reporting for a multitude of industries from early startups to Pre-IPO to public companies nationally and globally.
Her unique understanding, problem-solving skills and providing reliable solutions have benefited clients in various industry sectors.
Howard Ho is a Vice President at Wells Fargo Bank. His career began over 20 years ago allowing him to take on many senior leader roles all across the San Francisco Bay Area including the Peninsula, South Bay, and Greater East Bay regions. Currently, Howard serves as the regional banking Senior District Manager of the Tri Valley District where he is responsible for a team who serves the community with financial resources. He leads his organization to contribute positively towards the sustainability of small businesses and helps connect community members to the resources needed in order to thrive.
Howard’s passion is in developing leaders and has a strong belief in investing in people. He has held positions in serving local nonprofits like Junior Achievement, American Heart Association, Habitat for Humanity, and most recently served on the board of Teen Esteem in Danville. Howard is delighted to bring his banking expertise as he joins the board of the US Pan Asian American Chamber of Commerce (USPAACC) as a corporate board member.
Howard holds a Bachelor Degree from San Jose State, California. When his schedule permits, Howard enjoys spending quality time with his three daughters.
Rahul is the Founder and CEO of Triune Infomatics, an IT staffing company based in Fremont, California. With a nationwide presence, Triune offers staffing solutions to clients in the education, government, and commercial sectors, and has been recognized multiple times by Inc Magazine as one of the fastest-growing IT staffing companies. Rahul is also a Certified Executive Coach and actively participates in volunteer work as the Chair for Minority Business, a board member for IT Serve, and an Alumni Board member for Cal State East Bay.
What sets Triune apart from other staffing companies is its unwavering commitment to People, Quality, Cost, and Delivery. Triune’s goal is to provide its clients with a comprehensive staffing solution, whether they are looking to hire contract, contract-to-hire, or full-time employees.
Rahul, resides in San Ramon, California with his wife and two children. He enjoys playing tennis and golf in his spare time.
Brian’s values are leading with empathy, equality, and creating equity within diverse communities. Throughout his 10+ year career in Technology, he has developed an expertise in designing and scaling large architectural systems for Fortune 500 companies, most recently as a Senior Manager in Technical Architecture for Salesforce. Additionally, he currently serves as the Global President for Asiapacforce, a Salesforce Equality Group that is a resource and community to empower Salesforce employees, the Asia Pacific community, and allies globally.
Brian graduated from Boston University with a B.S. in Biomedical Engineering, where he also founded his first startup. He continued to work in multiple startups after moving to San Francisco to pursue tech. He currently resides there with his wife, Tina and their rescue dog, Soba. In his free time, you can find him celebrating cultural events in and exploring the restaurants of the Mission and Chinatown.
Darcy Paul recently completed eight years of service on the Cupertino City Council, where he served two terms as a Councilmember. Prior to that, he served seven years as a Parks and Recreation Commissioner. While on the City Council, Darcy was selected by his fellow Councilmembers as Mayor three times, serving in that role in 2018, 2021 and 2022. On Council, Darcy focused his efforts on delivering equity in a functional manner for the City of Cupertino, with notable accomplishments including prioritizing community space such as the Cupertino Library expansion, containing significant community meeting space, equitable park distribution for areas of the City that are historically park deficient, environmental measures such as Cupertino’s first and second Climate Action Plans, and a number of community discussions and events geared towards promoting effective and interesting public engagement, such as a publicly-accessible augmented reality workshop and conversations about such topics as the Chinese Exclusion Act and its legacy.
In private-sector life, Darcy is an attorney. He attended Harvard College as a pre-med and returned to Harvard for law school. Following graduation, he became a patent attorney, although his area of specialty was patent litigation, a field where he worked in both New York and locally. In 2009, following an unsuccessful run for City Council in Cupertino, he opened up his own law practice in Cupertino, which he subsequently moved to Santa Clara, where it has been located since 2012. Darcy’s areas of focus are litigation- and transaction-oriented matters for small to mid-sized businesses.
From 2010 to 2014, Darcy served as a board member on the Cupertino Chamber of Commerce, where he served as their board president in 2014. In 2014, Darcy ran for the Cupertino City Council a second time, and was elected to office. In 2018, Darcy was re-elected with a then-record number of votes. During his time in office, Darcy dealt with a broad range of issues, including voter engagement, the pressures of development, and a number of issues of great concern to the constituency, including, for instance, the presence of a cement factory within the sphere of influence of the City and directly adjoining a residential area. Overall, his focus became centered upon the question of how best to balance out the various competing factors in a democratic society. He believes that our system has the potential to work well, but he also strongly believes that certain basic principles are critically necessary to adhere to in order for the system to be functional, let alone optimal. He looks forward to our conversation over lunch.
Doris Yeh is the CEO and Founder of Mirapath. In her role, Doris drives strategy for the company using Mirapath’s four core values: relationships matter, commitment to excellence, results driven, and strive for innovation and excellence – while having fun and enjoying the journey together. She is passionate about leadership development for both herself and her team as well as learning cutting-edge technology related to platform development in the data center and IoT space paired with AI and Automation.
Mirapath ‘s number was #54 fastest-growing women-owned business. In 2017, the company was on the Fast 100 Asian American Business by USPAACC, the CRN Fast Growth 150, and the CRN Solution Provider 500, as well as the #6 Biggest Minority-Owned Business by Silicon Valley Business Journal.
Doris holds a BSEE from the University of São Paulo and graduated in 2018 from the prestigious Harvard Business School Owner President Management (OPM52) program through a scholarship. She is nominated Silicon Valley Women of Influence in 2018 by Silicon Valley Business Journal. Doris is fluent in English, Mandarin, and Portuguese.
Doris believes that rest is as important as hard work so her rest time is devoted to her kids, family and friendship, women and youth leadership development, real estate investment, bachata dancing and travel.
Shashank Shekhar is the Founder and CEO of InstaMortgage. He is a podcast host, best-selling author, and keynote speaker. He is the winner of the Stevie Awards 2022 Entrepreneur of the Year. The national media frequently quotes him, and his articles have been published in Inc. Forbes, HousingWire, and Huffington Post.
Wayne is an Executive Director and Relationship Executive for the Middle Market banking team in Northern California, based in Walnut Creek. He has over 22 years of experience in Commercial Banking serving the needs of middle market companies in the Bay Area.
Prior to joining Chase, Wayne was a senior relationship manager at Citi Commercial Bank based in San Francisco, where he was responsible for managing a portfolio of domestic and multinational companies in Northern California. Prior to Citi, Wayne was a senior relationship manager at Wells Fargo Bank where he originated over $500MM in new loan commitments in various lending products. Prior to Wells Fargo, Wayne served as senior associate and relationship manager for Silicon Valley Bank. Wayne has experience in C&I loans, commercial real estate, asset based lending, syndicated and leverage loans, and technology industry lending.
Wayne is active in the local communities and was previously a member of the capital campaign advisory board for the Jimmy Doolittle Air & Space Museum in Fairfield, California as well as a member of Association for Corporate Growth, East Bay chapter.
Wayne is a CFA Charter holder since 2004 and received his BA in Economics and minor BS in Business Administration from University of California at Berkeley. Wayne is married with one son and lives in Alamo, California. In his spare time, he enjoys golfing, sailing, skiing and travelling around the world with his family.
Tim is responsible for developing, maintaining and administering San Jose Water’s (SJW)Utility Supplier Diversity Program (USDP) and supports San Jose Water Group (SJW Group) Supplier Diversity Programs in Connecticut, Maine and Texas.
Tim currently serves on the Board of Directors for the Women’s Business Enterprise Council – Pacific, the Boy Scouts of America, Silicon Valley – Monterey Bay Chapter and the National Utility Diversity Council’s (NUDC) Advisory Committee. Tim served as President of the Industry Council for Small Business Development (ICSBD) from 2016 to 2019 and also served on the Institute of Supply Management’s (ISM) Diversity Committee and the Disabled Veteran Business Alliance Advisory Council.
Prior to accepting his position at San Jose Water Company, Tim led the Prime Supplier Program at Pacific Gas & Electric Company, where he worked for several years in the capacity of Supplier Diversity Consultant. Prior to his employment at PG&E Tim also worked in supply management for the Boeing Company, Edison International and AT&T / Lucent Technologies / Alcatel-Lucent.
Tim earned his Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from The Ohio State University and his Masters of Science in Computer Integrated Manufacturing from Brigham Young University. He is a Certified Professional in Supplier Diversity (CPSD), through the Institute of Supply Management (ISM)
In his spare time, Tim enjoys creating memories around golfing, skiing, Ohio State football and basketball, and spending as much time as possible with his family and friends.
Roger Cheng recently joined AT&T as a Sr. Supplier Diversity Sourcing Manager. Prior to AT&T, Roger spent the previous 14+ years with M/WBEs in the technology space leading business development through Supplier Diversity.
Roger, also known as “The Voice,” has served as emcee or VOG for a number of organizations across the country. In 2017, Roger was recognized as the #Hes4Shes Champion at the WBENC National Conference.
Carolyn Joshua is an entrepreneur, global advisor, venture capitalist, and a passionate advocate for a diverse and inclusive workplace. Carolyn is the President and CEO of Trilyon, Inc., which she founded in 2009. Trilyon started as a technical writing services company and now provides a full suite of innovative technology services to Fortune 500 companies. A results-driven and accomplished business leader, she is passionate about building great companies, developing strong teams, and creating a win-win model for her customers and partners.
Carolyn is a General Partner in the Early Equity Capital fund and fosters and guides small businesses. She is an LP in the How Women Invest fund, a leading program that promotes women leaders in venture capital. Carolyn is an advocate for the How Women Lead initiative #GetOnBoard. Carolyn serves as an Advisor for the Women Leaders For The World Fellowship Program, a transformative leadership training program that brings together women leaders who are social change innovators and industry disruptors.
As Co-founder of Akraya and Founder of Women Back to Work, Sonu Ratra is a strong believer that with success comes responsibility. Sonu Ratra has been recognized as a highly motivated and focused thought-leader in the Talent and Staffing industry. Besides leading Akraya’s aggressive growth strategies, Ratra serves on the Board of Directors at the Institute of Economic Empowerment for Women to support their Peace through Business program. She also serves on the Foundation Board at the Silicon Valley Leadership Group. A past winner of the Enterprising Woman of the Year Award, Ratra has received several accolades including the Woman of Influence Award, Northwood’s Outstanding business leader award, the Business Journal’s Community Impact Individual Champion award and Silicon Valley Leadership Group’s Doer’ award.
An entrepreneur with a charitable heart, Ratra is passionate about giving back to the community. Over the years, she has been an avid supporter for women’s empowerment. She is currently spearheading the initiative “Women Back to Work,” a workforce re-entry program for women. Akraya, Inc. is a Global Staffing and Managed services company headquartered in Santa Clara, California. Named Best Places to Work for three consecutive years, Akraya is also ranked by the Staffing Industry Analysts as the Best Staffing Company to Temp and Work for.
Maitjian Welke is the Founder and Co-Owner of CMIT Solutions Silicon Valley which is an IT Managed Service Provider specializes in IT infrastructure, Cyber Security, IT Consulting & CIO/CISO services. Maitjian Welke has Computer Science background and extensive IT & Software Engineering experience of over 20 years working in fortune 500 corporations including IBM, SUN, CISCO, AMEX, NCR and GOOD Technology prior to starting CMIT Solutions here in Silicon Valley in 2009. Maitjian has served on the Board of Industry Council for Small Business Development as the CIO since 2014. As an active VAR Channel Partner for fortune 500 computer manufacturers, she has been recognized in the Women of the Channel by CRN Magazine multi years in a row for her leadership and accomplishments.
Maitjian is passionate about helping small and medium corporations with their Technology and Cyber Security. Her article on Email Security was published in the CIO Story Magazine in the 2015 Cyber Security and Cisco Edition. She had been invited to be on the Cyber Security Panelists for a number of Cyber Security Summits and Expos in San Jose, Fresno and Los Angeles and provided a number of Cyber Security webinars for professionals in recent years.
Mr. Wong is an executive in residence of Plug and Play Technology Center, Mentor at the U.S. National Laboratory Entrepreneurship Academy, mentor at the University of California Entrepreneurship Academy, mentor at Clean Tech Open, Porter is also an executive in residence at Alley/Verizon Ventures Palo Alto. He is a consultant of the US Department of Commerce MBDA (Minority Business Development Agency) Northern California Business Centers and California Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development’s Small Business Technical Assistance Expansion Program.
Porter is also a member of Ontario, Canada PV Caucus. Ontario, Canada PV Caucus is a working body that provides influential inputs to the government to shape solar photovoltaic governmental industry wide regulation and policy. Mr. Wong served as Chairman of IEEE Computer Society Santa Clara Valley Chapter. Prior to actively working with startups, he held c-level and senior management positions with four successful technology startups, two went IPO and two were acquired by Fortune 500 companies.
