The VentureFuel Visionaries

What separates corporate-startup partnerships that transform industries from those that stall after a pilot? Geetha Dholakia shares how leading corporate venture teams create strategic value by connecting breakthrough startups with the right people, processes, and business priorities inside global enterprises. Drawing on her experience at NASA and TDK Ventures, she discusses the role of deep techn...

How do you transform a legacy industry without losing what made it successful in the first place? In this episode, Michelle Watson, Vice President of Research & Innovation at Midwest Dairy, shares how one of America's oldest industries is reinventing itself around changing consumer demands for protein, nutrition, convenience, and sustainability. She explains why dairy is experiencing renewed growt...

What role should government play in driving innovation? In this episode of VF Visionaries, Kathleen Coviello, Chief Economic Transformation Officer at the New Jersey Economic Development Authority (NJEDA), explains how New Jersey is positioning itself as a venture enabler—bringing together startups, investors, corporations, universities, and policymakers to accelerate innovation and economic growt...

What does it take to build startups with the speed of a founder and the scale of a global enterprise? Shilpa Prasad shares how LG Nova is rethinking venture creation by combining corporate resources with a venture studio model designed to launch AI-native businesses. The conversation explores how emerging AI opportunities are identified, why founder talent often matters more than the initial idea,...

Buildings are responsible for a significant share of global energy consumption, yet one of the biggest opportunities to improve efficiency and reduce emissions often goes unnoticed: the building envelope. In this episode, Peyvand Melati explores how AI, drones, and thermal imaging are helping property owners, infrastructure leaders, and municipalities uncover hidden energy waste, identify critical...

Dan DeMeyere, Chief Product & Technology Officer at ThredUp, has spent more than a decade helping scale one of the world’s largest online resale marketplaces, growing from one of the company’s earliest engineers into the leader of product and technology strategy today. Dan operates at the intersection of AI, ecommerce, and marketplace logistics, with a focus on how emerging technologies are reshap...

In this episode, Anish Patel, chief investment and operating officer at Yamaha Motor Ventures shares how Yamaha is rethinking corporate venture capital as a core driver of long-term growth and innovation. Rather than treating CVC as a standalone function, Yamaha is building a more integrated approach—connecting venture investing with strategic partnerships and internal business priorities. Recorde...

A year ago, VentureFuel Founder & CEO Fred Schonenberg sat down with Kasey Cronquist, President of the U.S. Highbush Blueberry Council and the North American Blueberry Council, to discuss the launch of the Blueberry Boost Accelerator — a first-of-its-kind program created in partnership with VentureFuel to spark innovation across the blueberry industry. We’re re-releasing this conversation to celeb...

Tinku Malayil Jose, Head of the Vertical Technology Office for HiTech at Quest Global, has more than 20 years of experience building complex products, from smart TVs and streaming platforms to automotive systems and IoT. Tinku operates at the intersection of silicon, software, and real-world application. We asked him to break down the shift from AI hype to reality, explaining why the future of AI...

Jesse Draper is the Founding Partner of Halogen Ventures, a Los Angeles–based VC firm investing in early-stage consumer and B2B startups led by female and co-ed teams. A fourth-generation venture capitalist and the first solo female GP in LA, Jesse has backed more than 100 companies, 6 of which are now valued at over a billion (unicorns), while building a platform focused on uncovering overlooked...

Charlie O’Donnell is one of the most influential figures in New York’s startup ecosystem. With more than two decades of experience spanning Union Square Ventures, First Round Capital, and then creating the first venture capital fund based in Brooklyn, Charlie has backed well-over 100 early-stage startups. In this all-Brooklyn episode, Charlie brings his uniquely candid and deeply informed perspect...

Prabagar Sankar, Senior Engineer at Intuitive, a leader in robotic-assisted healthcare innovation, shares a front-line perspective on how healthcare innovation actually makes it from lab to patient. We explore the critical role of concurrent engineering and early stakeholder alignment in bridging the gap between technical breakthroughs and real-world, regulated deployment. With experience spanning...

Katie Teuber, Director of Startup Engagement at Comcast NBCUniversal LIFT Labs, shares how to identify the right startup partners, pilot their innovative solutions, and most-importantly scale them across a large enterprise. From AI transformation to building true partnerships (not just vendor relationships), Katie shares how she bridges the gap between startup speed and enterprise complexity to co...

Raju Dandigam, Engineering Manager at Navan, the all-in-one travel, corporate card, and expense management platform built for modern enterprises shares what it takes to build high-impact products that scale. Raju has more than 14 years of experience spanning front-end engineering, full-stack development, DevOps, and team leadership. From leading the development of Navan’s rewards and personal trav...

Corporate innovation programs often generate activity but struggle to produce measurable business impact. Ronja Stoffregen, Director of Corporate Venturing at REHAU New Ventures, shares how venture clienting can bridge that gap by turning startup partnerships into operational outcomes. Leading REHAU’s corporate venturing efforts across mobility, manufacturing, medtech, and the built environment, R...

Scaling innovation inside a global legacy brand isn’t about ideas — it’s about execution, alignment, and measurable impact. Manasa Nalla, Associate Director of Product Innovation & Strategy at The Duracell Company, explores how enterprise leaders can move from innovation activity to scaled business growth. With nine years at Duracell spanning engineering, R&D, and product strategy, Manasa shares h...

With a data engineer career spanning telecom (AT&T) and global banking (Barclays), Monika brings a pragmatic perspective on what it really takes to move from experimentation to production-grade AI at massive scale for large enterprises. From embedding governance and control by design, to having process clarity and investing in AI literacy; from the importance of unified data to humans-in-the-loop;...

AI is no longer a future bet — it’s a board-level mandate. But for corporate innovation leaders, the real question isn’t whether to invest in AI… it’s how to turn AI from experimentation theater into measurable enterprise value. Taylor Black, Director of AI & Venture Ecosystems in Microsoft’s Office of the CTO, works at the intersection of AI strategy, venture ecosystems, and internal venture buil...

In this special episode, we recap the Startup City Info Session held on February 18, 2026, spotlighting Tomorrow. City USA, the U.S. edition of a premier urban innovation conference connecting city leaders, investors, and industry partners. We break down what makes Tomorrow. City USA a must-attend event for urban tech startups and why it’s a powerful platform for driving real-world impact. Learn h...

Innovation leader Mark Treiber breaks down how corporates can stay ahead of platform shifts—from mobile and OTT to the creator economy and AI—and why the biggest mistake companies make is not making enough bets. From his experience at Nokia and CBS Sports to Paris Hilton’s 11:11 Media, Mark unpacks the collision of sports, media, culture, and technology, and how leaders can turn emerging platforms...

Adèle Yaroulina, global co-innovation expert and author of the new book “Collaborate to Innovate: How Startups and Established Organizations Create Breakthrough Success Together,” joins Fred Schonenberg, Founder of VentureFuel, to unpack what it really takes for large organizations to turn startup partnerships into scalable growth engines. They challenge the myth that startup collaboration “isn’t...

This episode decodes the real signals shaping the future of food and beverage innovation. Fresh from the Winter FancyFaire* Food Show, Alice Ponti, Senior Vice President of Innovation & Strategy at VentureFuel, shares firsthand insights into what is emerging as scalable, defensible, and strategically relevant for large enterprises. The conversation explores themes gaining traction across founders,...

In this episode, Joe Rotondo, founder of Smearcase, shares how a post-marathon training run led to the creation of the FroCo category, a bold reimagining of frozen dessert made with cottage cheese, real protein, and clean ingredients. What began as a Brooklyn kitchen experiment has grown into a category-defying brand that's challenging expectations around what ice cream can be. Recorded at the 7th...

Jeff Barry is simplifying complexity inside one of the most operationally demanding supply chains in the country. As Head of Innovation at Dot Foods, the nation’s largest foodservice redistributor, Jeff shares how enterprise innovation moves faster and more accurately when it’s centralized, CEO-aligned, and always tied to real business outcomes. Jeff breaks down innovation as a four-lap relay race...