Board Members

Durjoy (Ace) Bhattacharjya

ceo, medicalrecords.com

Durjoy (Ace) Bhattacharjya is an experienced healthcare entrepreneur and interactive marketing executive based in Boston. Before trading the agency world for the startup world, Ace worked for some of the world’s greatest brands including Ford, IBM, Mercedes Benz, Starwood, JetBlue, and Pfizer.

Ace is currently the Founder and CEO of medicalrecords.com, a Boston-based healthcare IT firm connecting physicians with electronic medical record software vendors. Previously, Ace was a senior executive at the renowned EXOS, a leader in integrated performance training, nutrition, and physical therapy for elite and professional athletes. He was previously a Director at the United States Tennis Association / US Open.

He is an advisor and early stage investor to a number of private and venture backed companies including: Amino, Toscanini’s Ice Cream, SocialSign.in, AppliedQ, Digital Economy Ventures and Sharalike.

Ace has a BA from Boston University in International Relations / Economics and is an active Mentor in BU’s Kindle program. As a member of the International Academy of Digital Arts & Sciences, Ace is a judge for the Webby Awards. He is also a Senior Judge at the Harvard Business School Venture Competition.

Nicholas rathod

president, People of Culture Studios – Impact

Over the span of his twenty-year career Nick has built a reputation of building successful campaigns, businesses, governmental and non-governmental institutions and as a key advisor to the nations leaders. 

In Government, Nick served as Special Assistant to the President and Deputy Director for Intergovernmental Affairs in the White House and was the Director of Intergovernmental Affairs for the Obama-Biden Transition Team. In these roles, Nick served as a senior member of the White House staff and specifically was President Obama’s liaison to states and U.S. territories, handling political and policy engagement across the states, territories and tribal governments. Nick was especially critical in helping shape and get signed into law health care legislation, wall street reform and equal pay legislation. 

Nick was also a critical member of the team that set up and built a Government agency, called the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to help protect Consumers from being taken advantage of by financial institutions like payday lenders and others. He served as the Assistant Director of the Bureau and in this role was the United States Representative globally for consumer finance issues. 

Nick has also built a number of non-profit organizations. Notably, Nick was the founder first Executive Director of the State Innovation Exchange (SiX), which was created and designed to support state lawmakers with designing and getting passed into law legislation that protects the right to vote, civil rights and workers. During his time there, Nick merged several similar organizations together, grew SiX from an idea to a multimillion dollar organization with more than 30 staff and significantly impacted state policy making in states across the country.

In campaigns, Nick has served on a number of different Presidential and other campaigns. Nick most recently served as the campaign manager for Beto O’Rourkes race for Governor of Texas. The campaign was the largest gubernatorial campaign in American history and Nick was the first person of South Asian descent to run a statewide campaign in history. 

In business, Nick has built successful small businesses and is now the President of Impact and a founding Partner in People of Culture Studios in Hollywood. He is also a founding partner in a venture capital fund called the United Dream Fund which helps support and capitalize immigrant entreprenuers at the pre-seed and seed stages of their growth. Nick is also currently a partner in building the first ever sneaker and streetwear museum in Houston, TX.  

ani sanyal

CEO, Green Room Creative

Ani Sanyal is a multidisciplinary creative working at the intersection of business and culture. He is the CEO of Green Room Creative, a digital agency based in New York City, that focuses on scaling early stage companies through creative campaigns in a digital-first world. He is also the founder/CEO of Sanyal Capital Group and the co-founder of Kolkata Chai Co.

Ani is an accomplished speaker and has given talks at conferences and workshops around the world, including a TEDx talk which focused on his battle with kidney failure. He is deeply passion about empowering creators of color, and hosts a monthly workshop which connects emerging entrepreneurs with experts in the field. He double taps for The New Yorker magazine, Jay-Z, The Boston Celtics, and samosas from his favorite bazaar in Kolkata, India.

dr. ashleigh huffman

Global Director of Gender Equality, Athletes for Hope

Dr. Ashleigh Huffman is an experienced educator, entrepreneur, and published author in the global sports diplomacy and women’s empowerment movements. As the Global Director of Gender Equality at Athletes for Hope, Ashleigh is developing new programs to connect female athletes to local and global social causes. As the co-director of the U.S. Department of State’s “Global Sports Mentoring Program,” Ashleigh trained more than 10,000 global sports leaders from 75 countries on the use of sport for social change.

Ashleigh has a PhD in Sociocultural Studies and was a two-time captain of her basketball team at Eastern Kentucky University.

prakash janakiraman

Co-Founder and Chief Architect, Nextdoor

Prakash Janakiraman is the Co-Founder and Chief Architect of Nextdoor, the world’s largest social network for the neighborhood. Founded in 2010, Nextdoor is in use by over 200,000 neighborhoods worldwide, including over 90% of neighborhoods in the United States. Prakash has over two decades of experience building consumer applications used by hundreds of millions of people, most recently leading the engineering team for Google Maps. Prior to that he led teams at Shopping.com and Excite@Home.

Prakash attended the University of California at Berkeley and is a native of Hayward, CA.

Carie Small Richeal

Co-Founder and Editor, WSN247.com & Digital Marketing Professional

Carie Richeal, a former Division I basketball player, is the cofounder and editor of WSN247.com, a digital marketing professional, and a passionate advocate for gender equity and girls opportunities to play sports who is originally from Vermont and now living in Nevada. Additionally, she has travelled to Chennai as a faculty member for Crossover since 2012 allowing her to witness, understand, and to develop the curriculum and outlook for the program.

Carie is a champion of digital tools and technologies, with a track record of creating and executing successful social media programs and digital campaigns as well as engaging interpersonal events.

She has been involved with Crossover since 2012.

Dr. Bash Iyengar

Physician

Dr. Bashyam Iyengar is a board certified family medicine physician. He has completed fellowships in both academic and sports medicine. He completed an undergraduate degree in nutrition, which has served as the foundation for his work in the development of sustainable community programs to prevent chronic illnesses such as diabetes, hypertension, and cardiac disease. He is also one of the lead investigators for ‘Momentum’, a school based program aimed at promoting exercise and healthy eating for children.

He currently practices in an underserved and resource limited setting in Jacksonville, Florida, where he has started to develop a community based medical home model to address the many social and environmental disparities that act as barriers to health and well-being in this community.

jonah travis

Senior Media Associate, Taboola

Born and raised in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Travis grew up the oldest of five children. As a recruited student athlete to Harvard, Jonah was an integral part of four consecutive Ivy League Championships and winning two NCAA Tournament games. As a Government major with a Secondary in Economics, Jonah also directed social media for Harvard Ventures, interned with Wellington Management, and volunteered with Crossover in India for two-years.

Since graduation, he has grown his career in digital advertising working for Taboola with brands such as SquareSpace, Serta Simmons, and Blue Apron.

He is also the summer high school coach for D1 NYC along with a travel warrior to be witness to his siblings basketball, volleyball, and football games.