Venture Capital
SkyDeck has established an extensive network of top tier VCs and investors. SkyDeck facilitates warm intros to these investors and invites them to attend Demo Day at the end of each cohort.
Customer Development
SkyDeck has developed strong relationships with hundreds of businesses and enterprises that can be early adopters of our startups’ technology. These customer introductions help bring in significant revenue for our startups. By leveraging the vast network of over 500,000 living Berkeley alums, SkyDeck is uniquely able to make key introductions to executives from countless companies across any industry.
Mentorship
Berkeley SkyDeck has 350 advisors and mentors who actively coach and mentor our startup founders. Our network guide our founders on everything from product development to customer acquisition to go-to-market strategy and beyond.
SkyDeck Advisors
Access to Talent
SkyDeck helps connect the intellectual firepower at UCB to our startups. Through our recruiting fairs, we match hundreds of students, MBAs, and postdocs to intern and work for our startups. We also match faculty to advisory boards.
Commitment to Diversity
At SkyDeck, we aim to have the diversity of our founders reflect the world’s and are working to provide equitable access to our resources and programming in order to accomplish this.
In 2018, SkyDeck launched a Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DEI) committee to aid in our mission of achieving this goal. Since its implementation, SkyDeck has significantly grown the number of startups founded by female founders and historically-overlooked founders. In addition, we continue to grow our network of advisors and mentors who are committed to supporting founders from a broad range of cultural, racial, gender and socioeconomic backgrounds. For example, our program includes more than six workshops that specifically cater to female founders offering everything from networking opportunities to pitch coaching.
There is still work to be done and SkyDeck is committed to our journey in achieving more equitable access and greater diversity. If you are interested in learning more, please reach out to us.