May & June Newsletter
Speaking @ C2 Montreal, Building a moonshot startup for T2D, Attending EY Innovation Realized Conference, Turning 14 and graduating 8th grade, and more!
Welcome to my monthly newsletter! I'm Viola Seda, an impact-driven 14-year-old innovator, climate activist, and scientist who loves learning and exploring. My main passions lie in working on solutions to climate change, specifically in the energy sector. I have previously worked on:
banning single-use plastic to-go ware in my county, researching how oil refineries in my area cause asthma and target communities of color alongside UC Berkeley students, creating a new perovskite solar cell encapsulation layer, speaking in front of hundreds at the C2 Montreal conference, and working alongside companies such as Walmart BlueLabs and Amazon Alexa to solve some of their biggest customer problems with AI!
I am an incoming student at Nueva Upper School, and part of The Knowledge Society (TKS), a global innovation accelerator, where I am currently focusing on building in the alternative energy space (specifically in solar x battery tech) and working on solving some of the biggest global problems using emerging technology.
In my free time, I love reading sci-fi books, hiking, and exploring new innovations. Check out my LinkedIn, Medium, and personal website to learn more about me and the projects I am working on!
Speaking on C2 Montreal’s biggest stage - on my 14th birthday
On a Monday morning in early May, I opened up my messages to find that the co-founder of TKS, Navid Nathoo, was inviting me to a four-day, all-expenses-paid trip from San Francisco to Montreal, to speak about my project building a new encapsulation layer for perovskite solar cells, and attend C2 Montreal - one of Canada’s largest business conferences.
The preparation, late-night feedback calls, and my first flight alone were a rush of excitement and terror, but that just added to the amazing experience.
In Montreal, I had the opportunity to spend time with
, , , , , Santiago Garcia, and Marcus Samuel, who are all TKS students working on their own incredible projects, ranging from building an AI grid simulation platform to building vaccines to increase human longevity. A huge thanks to all of you for the amazing time, and of course a shoutout to who gave me so much guidance and feedback, and led me to the opportunity to be at C2 in the first place!Of course, the biggest highlight from C2 was definitely giving a talk on their biggest stage in front of hundreds. I spoke on the same stage as the President of Shopify, Harley Finklestein, and award-winning environmentalist David Suzuki, but that was not even the craziest part, because I gave the talk on my 14th birthday. A complete coincidence but something that made it even more memorable!
It was my first time speaking on stage and talking about my project in public, so it was a whole sea of new things, but I had so much fun, and it was truly a growth-inducing and incredibly important experience to build upon for my next projects and events!
Some of my biggest learnings and takeaways from C2 are:
The process, not only the product of something (in my case preparing + giving my talk at C2) should be valuable, and fun. If you are striving for perfection, and not learning from the experience of getting to the point you want to be at, you lose 90% of growth and value from the experience.
Being uncomfortable leads to so much growth. Embrace the scariness, and intentionally put yourself in uncomfortable situations - you will get 10x the value of a comfortable/safe situation.
Developing meaningful relationships through networking is key - not only to grow your network but also to create a community of like-minded and supportive people who encourage your growth.
Innovating a cure for Type-2 Diabetes for the TKS Moonshot Challenge
When I told my friends at school about my projects at TKS, I was told that I was the kind of person who would cure cancer one day. I had to correct them, and say that I’ll cure type-2 diabetes instead, because that’s been my project for the past few months, as a part of the TKS Moonshot challenge.
TKS Moonshot season is a month-long time period where teams pick a global problem, innovate a solution to it, get validation, build prototypes, financial models, pitch decks, and one-pagers, and then present our project to VCs who give feedback, and choose a few winners, based on presentations, product, etc.
My amazing team -
, , and - decided to tackle the problem of type-2 diabetes (T2D), which more than 422 million people suffer from around the world, and causes 1.5 million people to die every year, but still has no cure. So, we made our own.
Using a combination of drug delivery, gene editing, and nanotech, we created the hypothesis for one dose of medication to permanently cure T2D. Utilizing MOF-16 nanocarriers that carry a CRISPR Activator, which is injected into the bloodstream, our solution then targets the promoter of the SLC2A4 gene, to upregulate a protein called GLUT-4, and reverse insulin resistance, with the hope to cure millions.
In the end, we had an amazing time building out the project, and even won the ‘best presentation award’ from the VC judges! Throughout the project, I learned so much about health tech and building a startup, and discovered a passion for genetics while I was at it! Huge thanks to my wonderful team and to Steven ten Holder and Aatik Chopra, as well as all the experts we talked to, for all the support on our project!
Next month’s newsletter will come with more updates on the project, so stay tuned!
Attending the EY Innovation Realized In Focus conference in Palo Alto, and exploring the world of generative AI and Web-3
From networking with unicorn startup founders and executives from multi-billion dollar companies to learning about the future of sustainable supply chains with blockchain, the EY conference in Palo Alto was an amazing deep dive into the future of generative AI and Web-3 tech, and how it can be integrated into any and every industry right now. That made the conference even more interesting because of the diversified perspectives of people from so many different fields, ranging from agriculture to energy, to healthcare, with everyone excited to learn how these emerging technologies could impact their company.
To all the amazing people I met at EY - I can’t wait to see how your companies will begin to implement gen AI and Web-3, and it was amazing chatting about the future of tech in your industry. And of course, a big thanks to
and Nadeem Nathoo for the opportunity to attend!
Moments of the month!
One of the best parts of June was going to the Czech Republic to visit family and friends, and not only do I have so many amazing memories because of that, but also a bunch of photos! Enjoy the collage of some of my favorite moments from the last few months, from spending time with TKS students in Montreal to graduating 8th grade!
That’s all for May and June, but make sure to subscribe for updates on my projects and life, and I hope you enjoyed the read! Next month I’ll be talking about graduating from my first year at TKS (and moving on to the 2nd), speaking at the Amazon AHEAD showcase, being interviewed on a podcast with the founder of TKS, and starting to build out my project in the silicon anode battery space. See you then!
Congrats Viola on C2! You are such an amazing creator and I cannot believe how far you have come since Volta Energy!!