Join us to kick off the monthly Innovation Forum for the 2025-2026 school year! The Columbia Innovation Forum provides students, faculty, and staff the opportunity to hear startup ideas, network, form teams, and explore next steps. You’ll hear from Columbia faculty and other experts on ways to engage at Columbia, their experience in startups, and more.
The event will feature Professor Harry West, co-faculty director of IDE, and Ivy Schultz, Director of Entrepreneurship Programs joined by guest speaker Neil Daswani, ENG'96, co-director of the Stanford Advanced Security Certification Program, and an expert in data security.
Dr. Neil Daswani is a CISO-in-Residence at Firebolt Ventures and is Co-Academic Director of Stanford’s Advanced Cybersecurity Program. After completing his PhD at Stanford University, and leading security initiatives at Google, he co-founded Dasient, a cybersecurity company, that Google Ventures invested in and was acquired by Twitter/X. After his time at Twitter, he served as CISO of multiple public companies included LifeLock, Symantec's Consumer Business Unit, and QuantumScape. These days, he advises multiple venture capital funds and is focused on both securing artificial intelligence and using AI for cybersecurity applications. He has co-authored two books "Big Breaches: Cybersecurity Lessons for Everyone" and "Foundations of Security: What Every Programmer Needs to Know." Dr. Daswani holds over a dozen patents, has published dozens of technical articles, and speaks frequently at top industry events. He earned a PhD and MS in computer science from Stanford, and his career journey started with earning a BS in computer science with honors with distinction from Columbia University.
RSVP to find out about upcoming entrepreneurship programs, funding opportunities and events. Have an announcement or idea to pitch to the group? Contact [email protected] in advance.
This event is open to all schools and students campus-wide. CUID required to access campus.
Food will be provided.
RSVP via CampusGroups