Pitching to VCs as an Immigrant Founder: What Investors Actually Look For

A pitch deck is only the visible layer of a fundraising decision. At Open Atlas Summit 2026, Jyotika Gupta, Dhravya Shah and Sai Suhas Kopparapu will explore what investors are actually trying to understand: the problem, market, founder, evidence, differentiation and why this company should exist now.

Meet the Speakers

Jyotika Gupta

Co-founder and General Partner at z21 Ventures, bringing the early-stage investor perspective on teams, markets and founder quality.

Dhravya Shah

Founder of Supermemory, an AI infrastructure company, bringing the perspective of a young technical founder who has recently raised venture funding.

Sai Suhas Kopparapu

Founder and CEO of Winpra, an AI-driven real estate intelligence company, bringing an additional founder perspective on building and pitching an emerging-technology business.

What This Session Is About

Immigrant founders can bring unusual technical depth, global market knowledge and resilience—but investors still need a business case. The strongest pitches make those founder advantages relevant to the company rather than treating immigration as the story itself.

What Will the Session Explore?

Answer “Why you?” with founder-market fit

Investors want to understand why this team has a distinctive insight, capability, network or lived experience that makes it more likely to solve the problem.

Make the market concrete

Large market numbers are easy to find. A credible pitch explains the initial customer, buying behavior, wedge and how a focused starting market can expand.

Show evidence, even when revenue is early

Usage, pilots, customer pull, retention, technical milestones or unusually fast learning can demonstrate momentum before the business has mature financials.

Differentiate beyond “we use AI”

AI has become table stakes for many startups. Founders need to show proprietary data, workflow advantage, distribution, technical moat or customer value that survives model commoditization.

Run fundraising like a process

Targeted investor lists, warm context where available, tight follow-up, reference preparation and consistent metrics can turn fundraising from random meetings into an organized campaign.

Why This Session Matters

The panel gives founders both sides of the table: an investor evaluating companies and founders who have had to earn conviction from investors. The result should be a more practical understanding of what makes a pitch memorable and what makes a company fundable.

Important: Fundraising outcomes are not guaranteed. This article and session are educational and do not constitute investment, securities or legal advice.

Book your Summit tickets: https://luma.com/8c4qusfp