Hi, I’m Nikhil Velpanur. This website will (hopefully) be a running stream of thoughts as I navigate this world, carrying the burden of progress, in uncertain times.
Nikhil Velpanur leads Web3 and Digital Innovation for AWS Public Sector. He was previously part of the founding team heading partnerships, fundraising and public policy at the Wadhwani Institute for Artificial Intelligence, a nonprofit research lab applying AI for social good. Before that he helped setup Garage5B, a skunkworks and new ventures arm of Dr Reddy’s Laboratories Ltd. investing in seed stage health tech startups. He also started Brahma3, India’s first indigenously developed 3D printer, helped set up Wild Seve, a large-scale wildlife conservation effort, started the INK fellows program, ran a counterculture magazine called Strange Brew amongst other startup efforts. Nikhil is a 2009 TED Fellow, and deeply passionate about the application of technology for social impact.
Wrote a paper. It has gone into preprint, along with submission to a prestigious peer reviewed journal.
Attempted to start a substack as a blog, to get my thoughts out. It was an experiment, a tussle with inertia, and I learnt a few things:
There are these characters in my life - Artificial intelligence, Machine Learning, Large Language models, Web3, blockchains, metaverses, Robotics and Spatial computing.
Like American gods, these characters have been woven into my life script and I have no choice but to engage with them every moment, at work, at play and at home.
While I am fortunate to be creative and explore their applications in my professional career, I also get to play, build, tinker and mess around with them at play.
I hope to document some of the rabbit holes I am going down, and keep this as an open thought process - for no one but me. I’m not doing this for social clout or to inspire anyone. I’m just dumping my explorations here.