Raj Atluru

Raj is a founder and Managing Director at Activate Capital, and has been investing in technology, energy, mobility and industrial markets since 1996. Raj is a passionate champion of the entrepreneur, having founded three private investment firms as well as an educational nonprofit (Spotlight Foundation) after graduating business school.

Prior to Activate, Raj was a founder of Silver Lake Kraftwerk, a private equity fund focused on the energy and resource sectors. From 2000 until 2011, Raj was a Managing Director at Draper Fisher Jurvetson, where he founded the firm’s cleantech and India investment practices. DFJ was an early investor in companies that created entirely new markets with visionary founders – Baidu, Skype, Tesla, SpaceX, Solar City, EnerNOC, Box, Athena Healthcare, Redfin and Ping Identity. In 2005, Raj co-founded DFJ Element with Activate co-founder David Lincoln – the leading dedicated cleantech firm of its vintage. Raj has served on over 25 public, private and nonprofit boards including SolarCity (SCTY), Ping Identity (PING), EnerNOC (ENOC) and current investments Generate Capital, FLEXE, Nozomi, Ridecell, Scoop & Voltus.

Raj has an MBA as well as BS/MS degrees in Environmental Engineering from Stanford, where he began his lifelong passion for renewable energy systems. Raj was previously a Sandia National Labs research associate and an Aspen Fellow. Raj’s passions include skiing the steeps, running and cooking for his family in San Francisco.