Rahul formed our India investment advisory, Clearstone Venture Advisors, in 2005. Based in Mumbai, he is responsible for identifying early stage companies that will capitalize on the growth in domestic consumer services including wireless, media, entertainment, retail, travel and finance. Having recently relocated to India from Silicon Valley, he has leveraged his cross-border operating experience and industry relationships to lay the foundation for our investments in India.

Prior to joining Clearstone, Rahul was Area Director Asia-Pacific at Sonim Technologies, a wireless start-up in San Mateo. Having joined Sonim during its inception, he was responsible for the company's global marketing and sales initiatives including key markets like China and India. Before Sonim Technologies, he managed strategic alliances and partnerships at Airflash, a location based services provider that was acquired by the location based services market leader Webraska in 2001.

Prior to moving to the US, Rahul helped launch India's first mobile operator 'Orange', a subsidiary of Hutchison Telecom. During his time at Orange in the mid-nineties, he served in several marketing management functions at Orange including leading the team responsible for customer acquisition and retention programs in India as well as developing entry and growth strategies for Orange in Singapore and Israel.

Rahul earned an MBA from the Kellogg Graduate School at Northwestern University in Illinois.

Sumant joined Clearstone Venture Partners in October 2000, His primary passion lies in helping visionary entrepreneurs build companies around large markets from the ground up. He represents Clearstone on the boards of DiVitas, Mimosa Systems, Kazeon Systems, Billdesk (India), DiGibee Miicrosystems (India) and ThisNext. Sumant initiated and is responsible for Clearstone's investment activities in India.

Prior to Clearstone, Sumant spent more than eight years as an entrepreneur involved in starting companies both in India and the United States. Sumant was a founder of MyPotential, Inc., a multi-media company based in Santa Monica, CA, where he helped write the company's first business plan, hired the key management team, raised multiple rounds in angel and venture financing and built key distribution and strategic relationships.

As a Managing Director for Technip Inc., a company focused on infrastructure technologies in Asia, Sumant incubated and launched companies in the Industrial technology and renewable energy areas for the Indian and Asian markets.

Sumant has an MBA from the Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University, and a BS in Electrical Engineering from Michigan State University. He is a Charter Member of TiE.