Blue Ridge Labs' Impact Leader Talks are a series of engaging interviews and panels with leaders across New York City on the edge of technology and innovation. From tech to finance, non-profit to childcare, to mutual aid, we're sitting down with the people making real change in New York City.
June 7/8/23: This week, we're speaking with two impact investors from our Blue Ridge Labs and impact community that will join us for a fire-side-chat to share tips for founders on fundraising and what they are looking for as they seek to back game changing founders.
Tanya Beja
Tanya is a General Partner leading the Social Impact team, where she focuses on investments and incubations that directly benefit low-income and historically underserved families. Tanya has extensive experience at the intersection of venture capital, venture philanthropy, and social entrepreneurship. Prior to AlleyCorp, she was the Head of Latin America at Blue Marble Microinsurance, where she helped incubate and scale socially impactful, commercially viable insurance protection to the underserved.
Previously, she managed a $10M portfolio of grants and program-related investments spanning the homelessness, housing, and workforce development portfolios at the Robin Hood Foundation. Tanya started her career at IGNIA, Latin America’s first impact investing venture fund, where she was part of the investment team and also led industry and investor relations.
Tanya holds a master’s degree in public policy from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government and a BA summa cum laude from Tufts University.
Link here:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/tanya-beja/
Evelysse Vargas
Evelysse brings a unique experience as a limited partner and direct investor. Evelysse joins Zeal Capital Partners as a Senior Associate from the Growth Equity firm, Leeds Illuminate, sourcing and diligencing growth stage deals across the education and workforce/employment categories. Evelysse is especially excited about Zeal’s commitment to Inclusive Investing™ as the investment discipline aligns with her own passion for eradicating bias in the financial services industry.
Evelysse started her career working at BlackRock in the Financial Institutions Group (FIG) before transitioning to a role as Senior Investment Analyst at The New York City Board of Education Retirement System where she was responsible for $2 billion in private markets investments.
Evelysse’s passion for fostering diverse communities has garnered her roles on the Board of The New York Chapter of The National Association of Securities Professionals (NASP) and as Co-Chair of the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Committee at her alma mater, The Chapin School. Evelysse is heavily involved with Out for Undergrad, an organization committed to getting LGBTQ+ undergrads professional experience.
She is proud to have been born and raised in The South Bronx and received her Bachelor’s degree from Wesleyan University.
Link here:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/evelysse-vargas/
