René Bastón Email & Phone Number

New York, Ny, Us

New York, Ny, Us

Covenant is at the forefront of alternative asset management, specializing in both equity and debt investments. The firm's management team comprises seasoned professionals with a deep understanding of markets and a proven track record of success. The firm serves a distinguished clientele, spanning from family offices to influential institutional investors, including the State of New Jersey Economic Development Authority (NJEDA). Our portfolio encompasses high-net-worth individuals from prominent corporations such as Google, Amazon, Bain, Price Waterhouse, and Deloitte.Covenant is a Qualified Venture Fund for the NJEDA Evergreen Innovation Fund, which qualifies the firm to receive matching funds of up to $6.25 million for startups in which we invest. I lead the matching fund program and Covenant's relationship with the NJEDA. I source startups, perform due diligence, structure the deals, write investment memos, and manage the long-term startup relationships for this program.

Cincinnati, Ohio (Oh), Us

AKRU’s platform unlocks the commercial real estate market through fractionalized ownership and investments. I am advising first time founder on customer discovery and validation, MVP design, structuring early team, and investor relations.

Alexandria, Va, Us

Certified National Instructor for the NSF.Coached over 150 federally funded science teams in Lean Launchpad startup methodology.Since its inception in 2012, iCorps has trained 2500 teams. 1400 resulted in startups and have raised $3.16 billion to date.

Tel Aviv, Il

Team8 is a company-building venture group that creates and invests in companies specializing in digital health, enterprise technology, data, cybersecurity, and fintech. The firm's model is designed to identify substantial problems, ideate solutions, and help accelerate success through technology, product-market fit, and talent acquisition. It leverages an in-house, multi-disciplinary team of company-builders integrated with a dedicated community of C-level executives and thought leaders. Team8 LPs include Microsoft, Walmart, Cisco, Barclays, Nokia, AT&T, Munich Re, Qualcomm, Moody's, Temasek, and Sun Pharma. The firm has $1B in AUM and 34 companies in current portfolio - including two unicorns and 4 in stealth. For further information, visit www.team8.vc and see the video below.Founding member of digital health foundry.Integral to adapting Team8 model to digital health. Designed and executed strategic alliance strategy, resulting in alliances with providers, payors, employers, biopharma, and a network of senior executives across digital health sectors.Pioneered ideation partnership model integrating Team8's ideation methodology into organizations' innovation pipelines.Instrumental in the genesis of our first two startups in employee health and value-based care.U.S. point-person collaborating with founders on go-to-market strategies.

New York, Ny, Us

I was the Founding Executive Director and a Co-PI of the Northeast Big Data Innovation Hub, facilitated by Columbia University’s Data Science Institute. The mission of the Hub is to build public-private, multi-sector partnerships and consortia to develop and disseminate data-driven solutions to big, real-world challenges. The Northeast Hub is one of four Big Data Hubs funded by the National Science Foundation; building upon the White House’s “Big Data Research and Development Initiative.” In collaboration with the Hub’s Faculty Research Advisors, initially Kathy McKeown and later Jeannette Wing, I provided primary oversight for implementing its vision – working with the Steering Committee to develop the Hub’s strategic direction; leading, publicizing, and executing Hub activities; and conceiving, designing, and supporting partnerships. Led all strategy development and execution at NEBDIH, an organization launched by the U.S. National Science Foundation to build multi-sector, multi-disciplinary partnerships to address substantial societal challenges with data-driven solutions.Raised $9M in funding for NEBDIH and related projects.Established large cross-sector Fortune 500 and SMB collaborationsInitiated four major initiatives in health, education, urban-to-rural smart communities, and responsible data science.web: nebigdatahub.orgtwitter: NEbigdatahub

New York, New York, Us

I joined CUNY as a Special Advisor to help enhance and integrate its existing entrepreneurship programs. In this capacity I led a project to consolidate and expand CUNY’s entrepreneurship programs. I also designed a faculty entrepreneur onboarding process in collaboration with the Office of the Vice-Chancellor for Research, the new Advanced Science Research Center, the Hub for Innovation, the Center for Advanced Technology, Technology Commercialization Office, and the Industrial Academic Research Office.And, I had the pleasure of joining a stellar teaching team as a CUNY instructor for the NYC Regional Innovation Node of the National Science Foundation’s Innovation Corps program.

HVBio developed a biomolecular recognition and large-scale biotechnology production platform to enable self-assembled fabrication of single-walled carbon nanotube-based devices.Our first device in development was an inexpensive, fast, point-of-care diagnostic sensor.Coordinated IP and product development strategy and led successful execution of university IP licensing.

New York, Ny, Us

REAL leverages emotional sciences and AI to supercharge marketing and empower consumers.Designed and executed ideation strategy and proof-of-principle technology in collaboration with Columbia University data scientists.Coordinated IP and commercialization strategy and led successful execution of university IP licensing.

New York, New York, Us

I was the Founding Director of Industry Interactions and Entrepreneurship at the Institute for Data Sciences and Engineering (now the Data Science Institute - DSI). DSI is an extraordinary organization dedicated to the theory and application of data science across many fields of endeavor. Founded as part of Mayor Bloomberg’s goal of expanding the applied science base in NYC, an integral part of its mission is supporting and encouraging entrepreneurial ventures emerging from the research DSI conducts. My role there was to develop all of the Institute’s entrepreneurial ecosystem's components and integrate them with Columbia, the City, and beyond. I also developed and ran the DSI industry affiliates program to develop mutually beneficial relationships with more established industry partners.Led Institute-wide strategic planning.Launched data science-focused entrepreneurship program.Pioneered first official Industry Affiliates program at the School of Engineering focused on Forbes 2000 companies, resulting in 15 affiliates in year one.dsi.columbia.edu

Delivered following projects:M&A due diligence for RTI for potential merger focused on expanding toxicology and in-vivo pharmacology capabilities.Fundraising and strategy for early-stage medical device company.Financing strategy for early-stage, advanced fuel processing company.

New York, Ny, Us

As the founding Chief Business Officer at NYAS, I built a successful business development team and increased total business development revenues by 313%; a compounded annual growth rate of over 25%. Created and led Innovation and Economic Development advisory practice. Primary focus areas were biomedicine and clean technologies. Delivered multiple projects to NY State assessing its R&D activities across technologies with an eventual focus on clean technologies. Recommended investment opportunities and public/private partnership and innovation models to Governor’s Renewable Energy Task Force which were incorporated in the State’s Energy Plan.Developed inaugural international science and innovation forum for Mexico City Mayor’s Office and advised Mayor on development of two “knowledge cities” within City boundaries addressing biomedicine and cleantech, respectively.Advised Minister of Innovation of India on developing a nationwide Center for Sustainability Science to coordinate urban and rural sustainability R&D, commercialization, and economic development.Built alliances w/ leading universities, governments, multinational corporations, financial and venture firms, and NGO’s in areas of biomedicine, clean technologies, IT, consumer goods, real estate, and other areas in the U.S. and internationally, including India, China, Russia, Mexico, and Brazil.Initiated annual Strategic Planning activities and delivered plan integrating Academy-wide activities.Coordinated translational research center proposal with PriceWaterhouseCoopers to link NY area universities, industry, and government.Created “Science Meets Business” initiative to foster stronger commercialization links between academia, startups, and venture/finance. Developed Expert R&D Consulting Network model.Co-founded “Scientists without Borders” initiative in support of global health and sustainability.

Led multimillion-dollar licensing and research deals with leading pharmaceutical, biotech, medical device, imaging, nanotech, and IT companies.Created University spin-out companies.

Founded Medihub, which raised $1 million in its seed round, to provide supply chain and enterprise resource planning solutions to the non-acute healthcare industry.Engaged in every aspect of Medihub, from business and information systems strategies to partnerships and raising capital.Executed partnerships with i2 Technologies, Capgemini Ernst & Young, J.D. Edwards, Compaq, American Home Patient, Invacare, Sunrise Medical, and Healthcare Services Group.

London, Gb

Delivered client engagements in the following areas: eHealth (aka Digital Health) and dot.com strategy and operations, strategic planning and analysis, operational and information system improvement, information system implementation, supply chain management, revenue cycle redesign, and project management.Clients included: Columbia HCA, Ascension Health, Johns Hopkins Health System, Continuum Health Partners, Partners Healthcare, Mt. Sinai Medical Center, Baptist Health System, Stony Brook University, and Oregon Health Sciences University.Member of Ernst &Young’s eHealth team.

Researched the development and application of controlled medical terminologies. Collaborated with IBM to evaluate and enhance IBM’s knowledge representation software for healthcare applications. Led project to integrate the “Logical Observation Identifier Names and Codes” (LOINC) terminology into existing the CPMC medical ontology, the Medical Entities Dictionary (MED), to process clinical laboratory observations more effectively.

Managed all lab resources including financial, computing, and technical staff. Launched productivity enhancement program which, combined with renegotiating pricing agreements, reduced operating costs by over 8% of budget. Designed and implemented architecture of new laboratory information system. Continued research on long-term sensitization and potentiation.

Worked on various projects related to long-term sensitization in Aplysia and long-term potentiation in Rat.Cloned and performed functional studies on the Rab3 gene and its protein products in Aplysia and several members of the MAP kinase gene family in Rat. Established automated DNA sequencing and computer-assisted analysis facility.

Ma, Biomedical Informatics

Ba, Premed/Political Science