Rohit Gupta was working at a San Francisco investment firm that specialized in real estate as the housing crisis of 2008 began to spiral.
Gupta was struck by his firm’s exposure to the broader whims of that market, even if his own company was acting responsibly.
He was also meeting lots of ambitious Bay Area startup founders around that time.
He convinced his firm to take some bets on startup tech companies, including a succession of investments that included Counsyl, Palantir Technologies, Coupang and Biomeme.
Each one turned into a grand slam.
It was the start of an illustrious career in venture capital. Gupta, now living in Berkeley, California, participates in a few investment groups, including Future Communities Capital, where he is managing director.
The premise of Future Communities is to find tech-enabled startups looking to disrupt existing markets and to plug them into its vast range of potential partners and customers.
That led Gupta to Buffalo, where his firm has been the lead investor at two local startups this year. That includes the $1.6 million pre-seed round closed by HELIXintel and the $700,000 round completed by Ognomy.
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