Wallet Max Planet Positive Podcast with Investor Randi Plevy

​Join Bhuva Shakti, Founder & CEO at Wallet Max, as she speaks with female investors looking to leverage inclusion and impact without compromising growth of investments.

​​This month her guest is Randi Plevy, a Partner and General Counsel at Angel Hive, a New York syndicate investing in women led startups that improve the lives of women and girls.

​About Randi Plevy:

​Randi F. Plevy is Partner and General Counsel at Angel Hive, a New York syndicate investing in women led startups that improve the lives of women and girls. Angel Hive is dedicated to supporting women founders and educating investors. Additionally, Randi is a limited partner in Chloe Capital, a venture firm that invests with a gender and diversity lens in early-stage companies solving the world’s biggest problems, and a board member at The Kota Alliance, a Harlem based nonprofit working to provide a more equitable community for marginalized identities using a collaborative feminist approach.

​Randi started her career as a broadcast journalist working in small newsrooms in Texas and South Dakota before attending Brooklyn Law School. After a long stint as a homemaker raising her two daughters, she worked as a real estate attorney for 12 years before pivoting to venture.

​About Wallet Max

​​​Wallet Max expands fundraising for growth-stage startups in sustainability and climate fintech sectors, and connects them with an inclusive community.

​About Bhuva Shakti

​​Bhuva Shakti (she/her) is the visionary founder and CEO driving sustainable innovation at Wallet Max, a global community of executive women and venture capital investors with a mission to expand fundraising access for high-growth sustainable startups. With an MBA from Columbia University in New York and as a senior executive director on Wall Street for three decades, Bhuva has managed diverse financial portfolios and launched several digital transformation products for investment banks, capital markets, and payment networks.

​​Bhuva’s leadership and risk governance oversight, during the global financial crisis and the pandemic, was pivotal for the success of regulatory compliance and mergers acquisitions at the world's top banks and credit rating institutions. Bhuva is a board director and fractional C-Suite advisor for social impact businesses, and a keynote speaker advancing economic inclusion and climate-fintech partnerships.

​​Bhuva is the USA country director for World Business Angels Investment Forum and the Chief Ethics & Culture Officer for Women in AI worldwide. She leads the fundraising strategy and product operations for market expansion and manages investor relations throughout the diligence and investment. Bhuva is the founder of Bhuva’s Impact Global that provides board advisory services and enterprise risk management for public and private corporations.

Transcript

Wallet Max Planet Positive Podcast - Bhuva Shakti - Randi Plevy (FEB 2025)

BHUVA [00:00:05.17] 
Hi, everyone.

Welcome to the February edition of Wallet Max Planet Positive podcast.

As we settle into 2025, I wanted to quickly introduce myself. I'm Bhuva Shakti, based in New York, and the founder of Wallet Max. We are a global community of startups, investors, and executives focused on increasing funding access for women, especially in the climate tech, fintech, and AI sectors.

[00:00:32.08] 
We interview one impact investor every month for our podcast to share their background and what differentiates them from the crowd in terms of prioritizing impact along with profits and planet. We deep dive into their personal and professional journey and their mission to uplift.

[00:00:49.21] 
Today, we are speaking with Randi [Plevy], a long-term investor and a big supporter of women's initiatives. Randi is a partner and general counsel at Angel Hive, a New York syndicate investing in women-led startups that improve the lives of women and girls. Randi works with female founders via early-stage investment and is also educating investors. Randi is also a limited partner at Chloe Capital and a board member at the Kota Alliance.

[00:01:18.19] 
Let me now hand over to Randi and invite her to say a few words about her background and career path. Over to you, Randi.

RANDI [00:01:28.02] 
First of all, I just want to say it's so nice to see you again. It's been too long, and I love the phrase "Planet Positive." That made me smile.

[00:01:40.19] 
I took a nonlinear path to invest in startups. When I was coming up in the American education system...I'm Gen X. Startups in business in general was not really something that was put forward to us as a career path.

[00:02:15.10] 
I loved English, so I decided to study journalism in college and worked at a couple of newspapers and a couple of TV news stations around the country. I would say that moving outside of New York and living in Texas and South Dakota was probably the biggest eye opener for me in terms of informing me, Oh, wow, this is actually a really big country and not everybody thinks like we do in New York.

[00:02:50.19] 
That was really good to learn because particularly now, when I'm looking at founders who are from outside New York, outside Silicon Valley, I really pay a lot of attention to them because they're outliers, and they're usually solving problems that affect a whole large swath of people that we may not always be in tune with.

[00:03:17.21] 
At my last TV station, I was doing a lot of courtroom reporting and got really interested in the legal system. I decided to come back to New York to go to law school and thought I would go back into journalism, but then you go through the sausage maker so to speak, in law school, and you come out the other side and you look like a lawyer. You act like a lawyer. You are a lawyer, essentially.

[00:03:54.04] 
I practiced law for a few years with my husband and then became a homemaker to my two daughters for many, many years after that. I slowly stopped working in the practice and became really a full-time homemaker. Which I don't think as a job doesn't really get a lot of credit, but I think it's very important.

[00:04:25.07] 
Once my girls were old enough that I I didn't really have an excuse to just hover around them anymore. I went back to work in real estate law, which I still practice today, actually. And I wound up becoming separated eventually for my husband. Very amicable. We're very good friends.

[00:04:51.23] 
I always like to say that. He's my biggest supporter.

[00:04:56.03] 
I was tasked now with investing my own money for the first time in my entire life. Pretty late in life, actually, because I'd always thought that my husband was just smarter than me when it came to investing. Why did I think that? Really no reason, other than the fact that he was the husband. He wanted to do it. I...I.., I guess, delegated all of that authority to him and then found myself really not understanding.

[00:05:39.17] 
Of course, I had some retirement money with an advisor. That was all in the public markets, but I thought there's probably something else I should be doing in order to have a diversified portfolio. So I wound up, very luckily, joining a cohort of Pipeline Angels, which is now a nonprofit owned by IFEL. That was a huge turning point in my investing journey because it was a six-week boot camp which was designed to educate women on why and how to invest in startups. And it culminated in a pitch competition of women founders that we that have winnowed down over the weeks. We had all agreed to write a check at the end of the competition to whichever founder we voted most worthy of our investment dollars.

[00:06:44.11] 
I would say it was a mile wide and an inch deep as far as the breadth of the education, but I learned enough to know that this seemed like the perfect transition or the perfect juxtaposition of everything that I really loved and felt was important in life, which was great storytelling, advocacy, and feminism. I thought, Where has this been all my life?

[00:07:24.11] 
Then, of course, you start doing your research and you start seeing how few investment dollars go to women-led startups, which is shocking. Then how much less than that goes to women founders of color, which is just absolutely outrageous.

[00:07:46.01] 
I thought, Well, how can we change this? As I was thinking about it, I found out that there were other funds, other syndicates that do focus on investing with a gender lens. But there was nothing that took it a step further, which is why we decided to create Angel Hive. I was actually thinking about this when I was taking over some of the questions that you might ask me today.

[00:08:19.11] 
I remembered I was attending this coffee run by a guy named Jeff Scott. It's called Lean Startup Coffee Meetup, something like that. He holds it monthly. He encouraged everybody to write a question down on a sticky note and put it into the center for everyone to comment on. I wrote, “Does the world really need another angel syndicate?” Because I knew there were already people out there doing it. What it evolved into as a justification, really, for doing it was, okay, we're going to focus on getting dollars to women-led startups, and we're going to focus on educating women on why they should have a small part of their portfolio in startups, particularly at this huge segment of women that's never been given the opportunity to do this, but also make sure that whatever the product or service the founders are building has a positive impact on women and girls. It's not limited to North America, women and girls anywhere in the world. Although we're pretty new, we just launched last spring, so most of the startups that we've been working with are in the US and Canada.

[00:09:48.00] 
That's how Angel Hive was born.

[00:09:51.14] 
My partner, Heidi Diamond, who was in my cohort with me at Pipeline Angels, she's the yin to my yang. We don't agree on much, but we're very complementary with each other. I'm glad I have her because sometimes my ideas get a little outrageous, which is good. For me, it's good to put outrageous ideas out there. Then she's the voice of reason and says, “Hang on. Maybe we'll do that in a few months. Right now, let's focus on this.”

[00:10:26.04] 
Like I said, we just launched last spring, but so far it's been... I know I'm talking a lot, so if you want to interrupt me at any time, please do, because I could keep going on about Angel Hive and what we do, but I don't know if you want to save a little bit later.

BHUVA [00:10:47.14] 
In fact, I do have some follow-ups already with what you mentioned. I was planning to ask what's your unique secret sauce, but I believe what I've learned is educating as well as investing, which I think is a great initiative because I'm also a GenX, like you said.

RANDI [00:11:07.21] 
You are? 

BHUVA [00:11:09.08] 
Yeah. We are at this point in where we are building our legacy. We are trying to make, ok, what's the next investment or decision or career path or professional journey is going to look like? Then mostly 9 out of 10 times, I've spoken to so many people, everyone is thinking about paying it forward. Okay, what can we do that aligns with our passion and interest, but also gives back to the next generation?

[00:11:34.23] 
I think your pivotal moment could be the moment where you had the option to invest your funds in the private markets, I believe. One other thing also that caught my attention, which all of us know, pre-pandemic, the VC investment to women was around 2.8 percent or something of that sort. But then I would have expected that to either stay the same or go up post-pandemic, but it went down to one point something and very negligible to a women of color, which is at zero point something. Either we have to stay at least in the current position or should be improving, but what I noticed was it was going down, and that's why I wanted to talk to a lot of female investors like yourself, because it's not only bringing more startup, that are led by movement, but also having that pipeline of women investors who are willing to listen to them and invest in a different angle. But I also have this strong belief that impact investing may not be a nonprofit initiative because obviously, we have to grow our startups, our revenue, and help our startups to also expand markets.

[00:12:51.01] 
With that in mind, I wanted to check in with you. You are also very much focused on impact investing, especially investing, investing in women and girls. Why do you think that's a very good idea at the moment when we see a lot of things happening in the industry as well as where do you see the opportunities and what are some of the challenges with which you are focusing on Angel Hive with other funds you are trying to invest in?

RANDI [00:13:23.01] 
Yeah. More to your point, when I put that little sticky note in and said, Does the world need another angel investing group, particularly women-investing, women-led startups, a lot of the response was, We don't have equity right now. Until we have equity, this is not superfluous. I want to invest in an equitable future for girls. Because of our thesis, a lot of the focus is on health equity.

[00:13:55.20] 
I don't know if you're aware of this, but in 1977, the FDA banned women of childbearing years from participating in clinical trials. The rationale was to prevent them essentially from passing on congenital defects to their babies as a result of side effects of whatever treatment they were in the trial for. This was a well-meaning but overall paternalistic ban that actually resulted in the medical profession for many, many years, treating women as if they were just a small version of a man. And that's where I'm at. I'll also just to add to that.

BHUVA [00:14:43.07] 
Because you asked, have I heard? I've heard, but also I have seen it impacting today in many ways where there are a lot of diseases for which we are unable to prescribe medication or treatment, not because it doesn't exist, but because it was not tested for someone like us. There is no option to even treat because it's not about the scientific innovation, but because we were not included as part of that system. So please continue.

RANDI [00:15:13.15] 
I'm well aware of that challenge even today. It's stunning. I mean, that was something... Until we started getting inflow from founders and looking over their startups and what they were building, this is really how it came to my attention. I didn't even know about it before that. For many, many years, half the population was taking drugs which they had no idea what the effects on their bodies would be because it wasn't like they weren't using the drugs. They were still using them. There were just no trials to explain what would happen.

[00:15:59.23] 
It sounds obvious, but we're anatomically very different, and our hormones respond to treatment very differently from men. So women ultimately weren't protected by the ban, and the government finally woke up to that. That was 1993, around the same time my daughters were born. This is all to say that the opportunity in FemTech is huge right now. It's estimated as a $200 billion market. We do, again, see a lot of startups in the maternal health, fertility, menstruation, menopause spaces. There's an enormous market that's untapped and finally getting all the attention that it deserves.

[00:16:51.07] 
Part of that dynamic, along with more women participating in clinical trials, is also what I would say is the de-stigmatization of women's sexual health, for which I think you and I owe a big debt of gratitude to the younger generation because they looked around and said, “Why are we acting like this is icky?”

[00:17:20.08] 
This is how normal, healthy, functional women live. Why should we be embarrassed by any of this?

[00:17:27.21] 
I actually had such a fascinating conversation recently with a group of women because we're looking at a company that makes menstrual products for girls ages 8 through 16 right now. We all started talking about our first experience when we got our period. I don't know if you've ever heard of this, but in some Jewish households, it's a tradition to smack your daughter across the face.

BHUVA [00:17:54.11] 
Really? Okay, I did not know that.

RANDI [00:17:58.11] 
Yeah. Actually, that was both my experience and also Heidi's experience. It's actually pretty scary. The message is that there's something that's unclean about you that you should be ashamed of. I don't want my mom to watch us and have anyone think that she actually smacked me really hard. She didn't, but I was still shocked because I wasn't expecting it.

[00:18:32.00] 
It's just an example of...In other countries, like Nepal, for instance, where women still have to go sleep in a cave at night when they're menstruating and are subject to being bitten by poisonous snakes and not making out of the cave alive.

BHUVA [00:18:52.12] 
It's also a very extreme weather in that place.

RANDI [00:18:57.21] 
Yeah. Yeah. So, that's a lot of what we're looking at. I always like to say to people, Try me, because we do get a lot of FemTech deal flow, but I'm always... People are like, What about this? What about this? And I'm like, Try me. I think things that impact women and girls for good is probably much bigger than we even realize right now.

[00:19:25.09] 
Someone asked me, “What do you think about a male birth control product?”

[00:19:29.22] 
I said, like a pill, for instance, and I said, I love it, I just don't know if they would take it. That's the only thing.

BHUVA [00:19:38.01] 
Yeah, exactly.

RANDI [00:19:39.08] 
Because they're not the ones who get pregnant. So I think we're seeing a lot of amazing founders who are building a lot of really cool products. The biggest challenge for us right now is differentiation, because when you see Maybe 25 investor decks in the menopause space, they start to look very similar. When I talk to founders, I'm always saying, Okay, well, what you're building right now looks a lot like what X is already selling. How are you distinguishable? I definitely do have this sense of FOMO because it's tough. I'm like, Everything you're saying sounds smart. Everything you're building, I love and sounds good. It's just that there's this other company that's also, in a lot of it's telemedicine, that's also tracking women's hormones, that's also providing prescriptions, if you should so need it, that's also providing private counseling. I really do struggle with trying to, as they say, pick the winner, for instance.

[00:20:51.19] 
I know a lot of funds who will say, We need a menopause company. It's like, Okay, I get it. You want to in the space because it's really hot. But for me, and it could be also just because I'm still only in this, doing this for a few years, I'm definitely really taking my time to try to parse out who I think will be successful and who's doing something that I haven't already heard about. That's a big part of that.

BHUVA [00:21:26.01] 
Yeah. And also one way I also try to use the process of elimination is when I see three decks, three solutions that look exactly the same. I always bet on the founder. I try to...See, because it's always great to strategize an idea, but then to operationalize and execute and expand across markets, listen to your customer, make it successful. It takes the founder and the team to really come together to make it happen. That's one of the areas that I also try to bet a lot on people because the idea can be pivoting at some point.

[00:22:08.00] 
But then if we have the right team in place, any idea can be operationalized. That's actually my belief. So thanks for sharing that. In terms of opportunities and challenges that you've mentioned, and you're also going to be very bullish in this sector because we see a lot of innovation coming on a day-to-day basis. But then you launched in last spring.

RANDI [00:22:31.15] 
We are in almost like a year anniversary at this point in time.

BHUVA [00:22:37.03] 
But you also see the current political landscape.

[00:22:40.00] 
With that, even the big corporations or private investors, they are shifting their priorities. They are shifting their priorities from inclusion and impact to something else that is not inclusion or impact. But then I believe our message, both your message my message and investors like ourselves is we are not asking for exclusion of a specific sector. Rather, we are trying to give opportunity to a sector that was typically excluded in the past and try to give an equal playing field.

[00:23:18.12] 
In this scenario, let us say in this month, I'd say in the past one month and through your evolution of your company in the past one year, are there any tactical changes you have done to continue to focus on your mission? Why do you think, even after everything that's going on, if you continue to focus on investing in women, you will be successful in the long term, but then you're also in a heavily regulated industry.How do you balance the political landscape, the regulations, and still continue to stay on your mission and attract the right people?

RANDI [00:24:00.11] 
Such an interesting question. We do invest for impact, but we're also very interested in investing in startups that have the potential for venture scale returns. That's still something that aligns with every VC thesis. No no matter who the founder is, is looking for to 10X or 50X on an investment. Like you said, we're not a nonprofit. Because we're also not an institution, we don't worry about whether our politics align with our policies. We have had specific challenges. Our our whole lives, and we have always had setbacks. But I think the long arc of investing in women and supporting women in government, I think that that arc is going to outlast both of us. I'd like to think that when women control the world's governments, if that day ever comes, that there will be less violence in the world.

[00:25:28.09] 
That's probably the a thing that actually not just makes women, but just makes all of humankind safer overall. I don't think we've changed our strategy. I actually posted on LinkedIn recently, “We're Angel Hive, not afraid to bow to the matriarchy.”

[00:25:49.04] 
I have no problem with it. I know that it sounds like a challenge to some folks who want to sue Funds for excluding certain founders. But like you said, this is about parity. I'm comfortable with our thesis, and I certainly don't want to antagonize anybody. But at the same time, I feel like I think our mission is solid and needed. I think, at the end of the day, it's all about, it sounds like a cliché, but creating the world we want to see, and this is my little way of doing that for myself, for my daughters, for my granddaughter, for my friends, my mom. You said something about regulations, and that actually, particularly in in the health tech space, that's particularly a tricky situation. That's been a real education for me because I don't come from a health background. I've really been learning a lot about not only the fact that women haven't been in clinical trials, but also just how difficult it is to go through the stages of clinical trials because they're multi-staged. If you don't have a pharmaceutical company paying for your clinical trials, they can be cost prohibitive. The idea goes nowhere.

[00:27:46.22] 
Investing in an early-stage biotech company that's doing their first clinical trial on horses, for instance, because it's not even safe enough to to test on women yet. It's super risky. Putting investments before the syndicate is something that I take very seriously, maybe even a little bit too seriously right now, but I'm working on that. I have a lot of people who are saying, You need to bring more deals to the syndicate because we're very slow to bring deals. But That's because, like I said, we've been doing this for the last three years. I want to be really careful that if I'm saying, Look, I know there are no guarantees, but I really believe in this founder. I really believe in this company. I really believe in what they're building, and I really think we're going to make money. I want to be so sure. I know you can never be completely sure, but I want to be as sure as I possibly can be. That's...that's stopped me from recommending certain deals.

[00:29:04.18] 
Interestingly, the one I just mentioned recently, the company that makes menstrual products for young girls, I originally diligence that company and then backed off of it because I found out that they had a really big competitor who had already raised a million dollars from venture and already had shelf space in different drug stores. But luckily enough, the founder didn't tell me to take a hike when I told her we were pulling back. She just said, “I'll just keep sending you my updates, my investor updates and let's keep in touch.”

[00:29:48.20] 
That worked out brilliantly because she just went from strength to strength after that. And...I...Because I like her so much. I was crushed when I had to tell her, I don't think we can put this in front of the syndicate right now, but now I'm so excited to do it because she's just a fighter.

[00:30:13.21] 
It's a real fighter, an amazing person. Like you said, a lot of it sometimes comes down to who that founder is, and she's just tireless. She brilliantly raised over a million dollars in non-dilutive capital. She's actually positioned herself into a much better space than her competitor now. I'm very excited about that.

BHUVA [00:30:41.07] 
Yeah, so that's what people [laughs] people people.

RANDI [00:30:46.23] 
I think you asked me...Did I answer all your questions?

BHUVA [00:30:55.22] 
Yeah. We spoke about your mission and how you are still continuing your mission, but it's not only because it's a nonprofit, but rather focusing on the bottom line. That's very important, like I mentioned. Because investing should also be sustainable so that we can grow and expand into other investments in the future. But one thing I also wanted to double check is when you're talking to your founders, you're putting investment first and then impact. But it works out well because it has to be balanced for any deal to work out. But how do you measure that? Let us say your tagline is investing in women and girls. But how do you measure?

[00:31:42.10] 
Because measuring that shows success plus also attracts more female investors to your community and more amazing startups to your deal flow. How do you measure and showcase that what you're doing is working?

RANDI [00:32:02.01] 
That's such a good question. I don't know if we have enough of a track record to say, take a look at how we've improved society because we've gotten more money to be as great companies. I really hope three years from now we can do that. Unfortunately, I think it's too early to say. Our thesis is so narrow, though, that you won't be a company that we invest in unless you are building something that we think is going to have a positive impact on women.

[00:32:41.05] 
So we get, for instance, we got a tequila company called Cowgirl Water. This is a tequila company that's targeted to women. Do I like spicy margaritas?

[00:32:58.20] 
Yes.

[00:33:00.08] 
But do I think that that's necessarily going to have a positive impact to women and girls? I mean, it's arguable. It's arguable.

[00:33:09.09] 
But ultimately, these are the type of founders, and we have about 200 founder members in Angel Hive right now, the great majority of which will probably never become portfolio companies because they really don't fit our thesis. But we still want to provide them with resources and programming to help them become successful.

[00:33:32.10] 
Then the other aspect of that is we have about 100 investor members right now, operators, people who work in finance, people who work in marketing, product management. We want to make their skills available to founders, too.

[00:33:56.04] 
Because what I noticed is in the angel space, and in more particular, the space that we invest in and probably that you invest in, too, people are not coming to this really because they think they're going to make a huge amount of money. We want them to, but they're actually coming to it because they genuinely want to improve the world, the world that they picture themselves and their children living in.

[00:34:29.17] 
And so typically what people will say when they join is, how can we help? And I love that everyone wants to help. I do this all the time, too. How can I help you? If you ever need anything, let me know. But it's actually more useful to say, Here's how I can help. And so I'm trying to change my mindset on that when I talk to people and they talk to me. I mean, obviously, I can't help everybody. But if they're talking to me and I hear something that they say, and they say, You know what? You're in the gaming space. I know someone who investS in gaming.

[00:35:02.20] 
Let me do an introduction for you. That's not a company right now that we're investing in, but maybe one day. It's a woman founder. She makes games for women and girls, but ..she wasn't...The space is not exclusively gender-focused right now. But we just want to specifically provide resources regardless because we still want women founders to succeed even if they don't become specific Angel Hive portfolio companies.

BHUVA [00:35:38.08] 
Definitely, because it's all about the timing also. So you can keep in touch, nurture them, grow them, mentor them, and then they would be fit for a right opportunity in the future. But also like the gaming space that you mentioned, even if you're not investing, making that connection could come back to you in the future. Maybe you'll get a better recommendation of a FemTech company that suits your portfolio.

[00:36:04.02] 
I'm all about relationships, also making connections, because you never know where you're going to get the next opportunity. Now, because your investment thesis is also very narrow at this point, but also targeted and focused on balancing investment and impact. I want to know, at Angel Hive, because we are talking about Angel High at point, how do you actually support women-led startups, especially in early stage, who do not have much traction? Already, we have limited funding going to women, much less to women of color. If If you're in early stage with not much traction, the chances are really very minimal. How do you overcome that? That clearly targets your investment thesis. Where do you make the balance that?

RANDI [00:37:01.23] 
I think there would be two different ways to approach it. One would be, they have a brilliant idea that we support, but no traction. We think that with the power of the community, we can help them grow and get to where they want to be. I wouldn't hesitate to invest in a company like that and try to help shepherd them by providing them with the resources of the community because we have some really heavy hitters in our investment committee. I mean, people who work in the C-suite of huge companies, and they have an incredible amount of knowledge to share. So I wouldn't hesitate to do that.

[00:37:45.07] 
On the other hand, I would say it's more common that we have founders that we really like who have good ideas, which maybe could be great, but we need to take a beat and see how they execute in the early stages. Of course, providing them with the same resources, but generally speaking, what they're building is something that they need to prove. What I'm thinking of specifically is there are some startups that rely very heavily on getting reimbursed by insurance companies. This is a heavy lift for a lot of new startups because you need to really sell the idea to them that this is going to save them money in the long run by keeping people healthier.

[00:38:48.24] 
So oftentimes, if we see someone in that space, we ask, let us know which insurance companies you have signed up and then how they're helping you market your product and where, and ultimately, how many subscribers you have and what is your churn like? How sticky is it? How many subscribers are you able to hold on to over six months, a year, et cetera. I would say that's just a much more common scenario than the first one.

[00:39:22.06] 
I would love to see more of the first type of deal where somebody comes in and it's like, this is brilliant, but they have nothing. I actually like that better because sky's the limit at that point. But usually, it's more of the latter type company that we're seeing.

BHUVA [00:39:41.12] 
Yeah. And also because once you're dependent on a third party, you never know. Even though you do the due diligence today, you have to consistently keep checking on it. Otherwise, you don't know where it may go wrong. But given this a dilemma and a challenge that you have, but still making your investment. Do you keep track of some emerging trends in this space when you are thinking about the idea to invest in, due diligence, when you don't have traction? Some of these trends, do you think more from a US perspective, global perspective, or futuristic? How do you match these emerging trends in this space with what you invest in and what you try to strategize for your own future fund?

RANDI [00:40:30.20] 
A really good question, too. Yeah, such a good question. I often wish there were more hours in the day to just read because there are so many amazing things not just being built here in US, but in India and other parts of Southeast Asia, in the UK, in the Nordic countries. We've tried actually as much as we can to form collaborations with other angel groups or funds in those areas so that we can try to keep tabs on what's going on. But it's tough. It really is tough. Then determining what the landscape looks like for regulatory approval in a country like India versus the what they're going to face if they try to break into the US market, which, of course, is where ultimately everybody wants to be.

BHUVA [00:41:39.01] 
That is tricky.

RANDI [00:41:41.10] 
And I think I'm still really in a learning stage with that, to be honest. I try to keep up with it. And I think investing in emerging markets is something I'm excited about, but also really cautious about because I want to make sure we're protected. I want to make sure that if we're investing, that the people who I'm recommending to deal to are protected, their money is protected. That can be tricky. But hey, I have not been to India yet, and I would love to go visit. Hopefully, I'll meet a founder that I love, and I love what they're doing, and I'll have a reason to go there and check it out.

[00:42:28.24] 
But some of...Some of the things that I think are really interesting that are coming up, one is precision oncology, targeted oncology treatments. Of course, AI is having a huge impact on that. I think we're going to continue to see more specific targeting of cancers that occur in women and also products that make testing safer and also less painful for women. So I'm thinking specifically of a diagnostic tampon that's actually on the market in the UK, and it accurately tests for HPV, which can cause cervical cancer. And I don't know any woman who wouldn't prefer to use a diagnostic tampon and then just send it in, just like you would send in your cologuard right now for testing to see if you have HPV.

[00:43:32.01] 
When I heard about that, I thought, Why didn't that already exist? It didn't already exist because even women doctors just fall in line with whatever state of the art is. The state of the art is changing very rapidly for women now, and I'm very excited about that. Something like this, I can't wait to something like this is adopted in the US. You can...You can use it now here as a diagnostic just for your vaginal health, but not for the HPV test, which I hope is really coming soon.

BHUVA [00:44:07.16] 
Yeah, diagnostics is half the battle, right? Like you said, before you get the treatment or take pills.

RANDI [00:44:16.12] 
Yeah. Exactly. I think we're seeing also a lot of new challengers to the current wearables that track health, and some of which also track security, which is really interesting. Again, I think AI is having an outsized effect on that. I don't know if Aura already has such a huge amount of market share that they are always going to be the incumbent. I've seen a lot of interesting ones. One is a wearable that women wear on their ears, like an earring, which is supposed to be more accurate in terms of testing than having something on your finger. I think that's a cool company that I'm looking at.

[00:45:04.23] 
Again, AI is going to continue to increase personalization in all things. Right now, it's very big in beauty and fashion, but it's also extended to hormone treatments at all stages of life. I think we're going to continue to see this very targeted personalization because obviously, you could have one woman in New York who weighs 130 pounds, and you could have a woman in Arizona who weighs 200 pounds. One is 30 years old, one is 60 years old. I mean, nobody's the same. I think we're going to see more of that. I think that's an amazing advancement that AI is mostly responsible for, is really drilling down on the specifics of what people need. That you're not, for lack of a better word, overdosing people on things because it's been a one-size-fits-all treatment up to this point.

BHUVA [00:46:12.15] 
Yeah. Yeah, no. That's a very interesting point because you also mentioned AI and security, and we have different types of women in different areas. None of them are the same at any point in time. Even within a same person's life cycle, they could be in different phases of life depending on where they are, how they are, and things of that sort. We spoke about AI and security, but privacy is becoming extremely important, especially there are implications to people's lives if some of the sensitive data comes out, even though it's for the patient's better treatment, it may not be easily acknowledged elsewhere. How do you balance that? Because I know Apple Watch is being very strict on its privacy laws, but I'm not sure about Fitbit, and I'm still trying to learn more about Aura. There are a few more apps like that. Then privacy is extremely critical, especially when it is legally liable if something doesn't go as per plan. How do you prioritize that in your investment?

RANDI [00:47:28.06] 
I think that you're going to have a lot of early adopters, and they're mostly going to be athletes or people who have illnesses chronic illnesses that they have to deal with. I think these people have already demonstrated that they're willing to trade off a certain amount of personal information in order to work on body composition or work on being able to get a good night's sleep. I think it's going to continue to be voluntary.

[00:48:06.09] 
I think everyone has to acknowledge that if you are willing to upload this information, you...No matter what anybody says, you're not going to...There's never going to be a guarantee on your privacy.

BHUVA [00:48:24.20] 
We're seeing- Not 100% safe.

RANDI [00:48:27.15] 
Exactly. It's...It's going to be up to the individuals. I think we've already seen that most people are willing to give up a certain part of their privacy in order to live what they consider to be a better life, whether that means a healthier life or a happier life or just a more spiritual life. I think we're going to continue to see that.

BHUVA [00:48:59.08] 
Yeah. At this point, it's more the burden on the consumer to make an informed decision. That's why you educating them also, your founders and investors, bring some credibility to the space.

[00:49:13.12] 
I know It feels like we can continue to converse for more time, but we are coming to the end of our discussion. Happy to connect again and set up a future discussion. But I want to check in. How can people get in touch with you and Angel Hive?

[00:49:31.16] 
Then what are some key areas that your community differentiates itself and attracts members? Because there could be competing communities like yourself. How do people find out what's your niche and get in touch with you and connect with you?

RANDI [00:49:51.02] 
Well, the easiest way is on our website, which is AngelHive.vc There's a Typeform there for people who are interested in getting more information on investing.

[00:50:02.11] 
There's also a Typeform for founders who can essentially send us their pitch and we'll take a look. I think, like I said earlier, I know there are other organizations investing with a gender lens, but I genuinely don't know anybody else that's taken it a step further as we have, which is essentially also saying whatever we invest in is also just going to be good for women and girls. I think that resonates with a lot of people because I hear it when I'm out at events and talking about it, and people are really excited about it. There is a big movement, which I'm sure you're probably aware of, of women moving their philanthropy dollars into impact investing. Also, they'll be owning two-thirds of wealth in the future.

BHUVA [00:51:00.13] 
Globally. They become more important decision-makers, but it's also good for us because we'll have more female investors in decision-making roles.

RANDI [00:51:11.15] 
Exactly. You brought up what everyone's calling the great wealth transfer that's going to occur where we're going to see more affluent women, and they are going to want to put their money not just necessarily towards hedge funds in private equity, they're going to want to invest in issues they care about. It's statistically shown that women are more interested in investing in companies that they feel personally benefits them. That's what we're all about.

[00:51:47.16] 
I think we're attracting a lot of kindred spirits, which is really gratifying. I love our community. We're still young, but our ultimate goal is just to provide a variety of resources to both the founders and the investors. We had our first in-person event last fall. We were really happy with the attendance. We had this amazing loft fashion studio at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, which was owned by a founder of a fashion company, Nasrin Jafari of Mixed. She was the host. We had a fireside chat with her. She's bootstrap and has an eight-figure revenue business and never took an investment dollar and never borrowed any money. Then we had that juxtaposed with another founder who was raising from investors and just talked about why you might choose one over the other. We did a webinar on storytelling and design. We do have another one coming up next month on AI, how to use AI to scale. We want to provide opportunities for investors to serve as advisory roles and for new members to angel investing, just to be a resource, too. We are tackling quite a bit.

[00:53:09.11] 
I sometimes feel a little overwhelmed, actually, when I talk about it, but it's a day at a time. We're bootstrap, too, frankly. We're a bootstrap staff. We're still taking it month by month and self-funded. But the response has been incredibly positive and supportive.

BHUVA [00:53:34.15] 
No, thanks so much, Randi, for that. I also think it's not only about investing and doing the due diligence, but the more you're able to create the awareness and education. It'll be more inbound for you, so you don't have to tell people why it is good. People will automatically come to you thinking, Yeah, it's good. You don't have... You cross that barrier of convincing people. So thanks so much again. Absolutely.

RANDI [00:54:02.11] 
I should mention, we did have a dinner for investors the other night, and I asked them, anybody who's willing to join our investment committee so that we can actually get more women looking at deals and giving us their opinion on what they see, what they think, and coming at it from their perspective. You should join our investment committee. You would be brilliant.

BHUVA [00:54:24.24] 
Definitely. Let's definitely talk about that. Then if you have that AI event coming up, send me and I'll also promote it on our channels and our community. Thank you. I look forward to seeing you at our dinner as well. It's similarly very like-minded set of impact investors and sustainable startups.

RANDI [00:54:43.09] 
Wonderful. I'm going to do a commercial for Camp Hustle right now. Are you going to Camp Hustle this year?

BHUVA [00:54:50.02] 
No, not at the moment, but maybe I'll have to decide in the summer. Okay, because I know you work with Angel Squad, don't you?

BHUVA [00:54:59.15] 
Yeah, I Yes, I do. I'm hoping, but I'm just going to make a final decision in summer. Do you plan to go there?

RANDI [00:55:10.08] 
Well, let me know. I would love to go, but I think Brian Nichols should give us the rate that we miss for not signing up as early birds just because we're good people.

BHUVA [00:55:21.02] 
Definitely. I'll also connect with him. I hope to see you again. I believe we can get other opportunities to meet each other. Thanks so much again. Thank you for coming in.

RANDI [00:55:34.06] 
Thank you. Good to see you, Bhuva.

BHUVA [00:55:35.15] 
Bye.

RANDI [00:55:36.19] 
Bye-bye.