Welcoming Global Shapers to San Francisco!

Every year, we get to welcome amazing Global Shapers who move from around the world to San Francisco. Read up on our recent cohort of Shaper transfers and get as excited as we are — they’re poised to create real impact in our community!

Keren Ruth Wong

Interim Director Of Development at RoboTerra

• Which hub are you coming from? Beijing Hub
• What brought you to San Francisco? Adventures in my career
• What is your favorite part of being a Shaper? One of my favorite experiences was being part of the team to launch the inaugural SHAPE China event in 2015
• What are you looking forward to most as part of the SF Shapers?
  Continuing to work on high-impact projects with young professionals across different sectors

Preston Kilgore

Development Manager at Street Soccer USA

• Which hub are you coming from? Lancaster, Pennsylvania
• What brought you to San Francisco? Graduate school at the University of San Francisco in Urban and Public Affairs and to pursue Tech and Politics.
• What is your favorite part of being a Shaper? My favorite part about being a shaper are all of the diverse people that are apart of this community.
• What are you looking forward to most as part of the SF Shapers? I am looking forward to connecting with shapers in the tech space and contributing to all of the great projects in SF. Being from Pennsylvania, I am hoping that being apart of the SF Global Shaper community will allow me to learn more about my new home.

Allison Baum

Principal at Trinity Ventures

• Which hub are you coming from? Hong Kong ->Tokyo
• What brought you to San Francisco? Work and a nonstop sense of adventure!
• What is your favorite part of being a Shaper? Having the privilege of meeting and collaborating with so many amazing, motivated, and talented individuals in every city in the world who not only talk the talk but walk the walk when it comes to changing the world.
• What are you looking forward to most as part of the SF Shapers? The ability to work with the other members of the hub to play an active role in rectifying and reshaping the systemic inequality and injustice that technology has played a role in creating.

Christian Umbach

Co-Founder & CEO at XapiX.io

• Which hub are you coming from? Frankfurt
• What brought you to San Francisco? Build a tech company — we make data from cars available to fleet owners, insurances and more
• What is your favorite part of being a Shaper? The diverse community — we leveraged that to create a platform to connect startups with enterprises in Frankfurt
• What are you looking forward to most as part of the SF Shapers? A joint project with Shapers in my field

Kathy Qian

Co-Founder at Code for Democracy

• Which hub are you coming from? DC
• What brought you to San Francisco? I spent 6 years in DC and was ready for a change of pace! It’s been incredibly refreshing to be surrounded by beautiful nature, temperate weather, and delicious Asian food. I’m also pretty excited to no longer talk about politics all the time — now it’s tech!
• What is your favorite part of being a Shaper? By far the best part about being a Shaper is meeting amazing humans whose paths I would have never crossed otherwise.
• What are you looking forward to most as part of the SF Shapers? I’m looking forward to getting to know the local communities here better and making a dent in SF issues.

Lolita Castrique

Consultant at FSG

• Which hub are you coming from? The Geneva Hub
• What brought you to San Francisco? I came to San Francisco to work as a social impact advisor, helping all types of organizations accelerate their impact
• What is your favorite part of being a Shaper? The Shaper community provides fantastic opportunities to meaningfully contribute to a better future. Along the way, I have been amazed by the diversity, the energy and the creativity of Shapers that I met around the world.
• What are you looking forward to most as part of the SF Shapers? I’m excited to be part of such a vibrant community of people dedicated to bring change to San Francisco.

Jenny Tchinnosian

Founder at Soulfire

• Which hub are you coming from? Buenos Aires
• What brought you to San Francisco? A desire to grow in the world’s most startup-energizing city.
• What is your favorite part of being a Shaper? Being connected with incredible peers who are also interested in improving the world, each in their own way, and being able to create new collaborations to spark those projects into scale!
• What are you looking forward to most as part of the SF Shapers? Using the tons of energy I have to help create a more beautiful world, through SoulFire Series and helping fellow shapers grow their projects and improve their quality of life.