Connect Who or what is your inspiration in business?

I’m a fourth-generation entrepreneur: my great-grandfather ran a gasket manufacturing business, my grandfather built a soda carbonation business, and my father founded a software company. Hence, I grew up seeing entrepreneurship as a way to build things that matter. My inspiration in social-impact technology comes from Mozilla, which showed me that technology can be built to serve the public and create a fairer internet.

How do you stay motivated?

I’m motivated by the belief that technology should empower people, not exploit them. The internet has become the central place where we live, work, and participate in society, yet ordinary users have almost no visibility into what happens to their data. I build tools that shine the light on that opaque system.

What would you do with the $25,000?

I would use the funding to expand Papaya’s AI agents that test how websites actually treat user privacy choices. Companies often claim they respect user choice, but it’s difficult to verify. Our agents simulate real users and reveal what really happens. The funding would help scale testing infrastructure and make these tools more available to researchers, regulators, journalists, and everyday users.