FULL BIO
Andrea Carafa is an entrepreneur, designer and educator with over a decade of experience in addressing social and global issues through innovation and cross-sector collaboration. He founded two ventures, and researched, prototyped, and lectured about entrepreneurship and human-centered design at Stanford and the University of Milan Bicocca. He was named a World Economic Forum Global Shaper, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce, a judge for the MIT Technology Review Innovators Under 35 Europe, and a member of the Partnership on AI to Benefit People and Society and of the United Nations Innovation Network. Andrea is currently an entrepreneur in residence at the Blackstone Launchpad powered by Techstars, the University of California's Office of Innovation & Entrepreneurship and UCSC, and teaches lean design and innovation through the National Science Foundation's Innovation Corps.
He founded ArtsUp, was a resident entrepreneur at Stanford, and co-created an EU-funded program aimed at spurring entrepreneurship and innovation within European universities. As part of the Global Entrepreneurship Summit hosted by President Obama at Stanford, Andrea chaired the Impact Entrepreneurship Initiative to advocate technological entrepreneurship and investing that pursue profit alongside a positive impact on society and the environment.
Prior to that, Andrea was an EU Marie Curie researcher in emerging technology for social and economic impact at Grenoble School of Management and the European Commission. He was also a European Science Foundation visiting fellow at Bocconi University, and a HEPTech visiting researcher at GSI and CERN. His work inspired CERN to launch CollSpotting, a data analytics platform aimed at accelerating the technology transfer from physics labs to society.
Andrea was a civil society representative at the United Nations on behalf of AEGEE-Europe. He created a multi-stakeholder initiative within the UN Rio+20 process and, together with other members of the Major Groups, advocated the establishment of the Sustainable Development Goals. He was also the founder and executive director of GYE and contributed to designing the first secretariat of Future Earth, a global science and innovation initiative announced at Rio+20, the largest summit in UN history.
Born and raised in Italy, Andrea earned a Master's Degree in Management from ESADE Business School in Barcelona, a Master's Degree in EU Business & Law from Aarhus University in Denmark, and a Bachelor's Degree in Economics & Business Administration from LUISS University in Rome.
He has been a public speaker, contributor and moderator at international organizations and summits such as the World Economic Forum, United Nations, European Institutions, Expo, International Cultural Forum, as well as academic and industry conferences. He has also served as an advisor to the Climate Infrastructure Forum and as a delegate to the United Nations Science, Technology and Innovation Forum.
