About Ajay:

Ajay Relan is an investor, entrepreneur, and community builder. Prior to Slauson & Co., Ajay was a founding Partner at Queensbridge Venture Partners. With a keen focus on brand building and storytelling, Ajay's passion lies in identifying trends and engineering culturally aligned brands.

A lifelong Angeleno, Ajay has established a business portfolio grounded in community. His most recent collaboration, Hilltop Coffee + Kitchen, has become a staple, facilitating productivity and collaboration in diverse neighborhoods across Los Angeles.

In 2012, Ajay founded #HashtagLunchbag, a grassroots movement that has fed 1,000,000+ hungry and unhoused people in 150+ cities around the globe. He went on to establish the Living Through Giving Foundation, a non-profit platform empowering the creation of programs engaging diverse groups of people to contribute to various causes in their local communities.

Ajay is a graduate of UC Santa Barbara.

Episode Highlights:

• The power in your lived experience and how it can be used as a competitive advantage. 
• When looking for founders, look for people who are delusional with their vision but pragmatic with their execution. Meaning you want to look for founders who are big dreamers with big goals but who also have a game plan, are focused and are willing to put in the work. 
• Life is overwhelming, especially in the VC world, so take some time to create quiet in your life.