JULY 12

The HBS Club of India recently launched an “Alumni in Action” campaign, which highlights stories of members who have led pandemic relief efforts. The first two alumni highlighted are Akshay Navaladi (HBS MBA 2013), founder of Healthskool Pharmacy, a chain of pharmacies in New Delhi, and Dr. Ganesh Natarajan (AMP 169, 2005), Chairman of 5F World, Lighthouse Communities Foundation, and Honeywell Automation India.

Navaldi’s highlighted contributions include “delivering medicines, oxygen concentrators, and medical supplies to patients at their doorstep all over India.” His startup, the club notes, has touched the lives of more than half a million people in India and has also exported medicines to many other hard-hit countries in Asia and Africa.

Dr. Natarajan founded the Pune Platform for COVID Response (PPCR), which raised more than $15 million and helped secure critical equipment for hospitals in Pune and elsewhere. Dr. Natarajan’s Lighthouse Communities Foundation also “set up citizen help lines, organized food supplies for the needy, and collected money from all over the world to equip a new government COVID hospital.” (You can see a video profile of Dr. Natarajan on the HBS Club of India’s YouTube channel.)

"At a time of crushing despair and grief, when India has been hit hard by COVID, we wanted to talk about stories of selflessness, kindness, and courage—how HBS Alums went above and beyond to help the community,” says Sunil Sood, the president of the HBS Club of India. “Hence ‘Alumni in Action’.... powerful stories of resilience, purpose and giving back. Stories that restore one's faith in Humanity and inspire us to dream of a better tomorrow."

MAY 25

Vinay Pasricha (OPM 39, 2010) cofounded an initiative called “Dost” with 30 friends to help provide medical aid in the Delhi region. As noted in a recent article in India Today, Pasricha’s involvement was spurred by a mid-April phone call from a friend’s wife “who was desperate to find oxygen for her hospitalized husband.” Pasricha has been directly involved in relief efforts, the article notes, personally transporting several patients to local COVID wards. “Instead of giving people numbers, we do the work for them,” he told India Today. “If someone needs a nebulizer, a medicine or oxygen, we get it to them.” The article goes on to note that Dost has saved some 85 people in the last five weeks and is considering launching a COVID relief van program to help carry oxygen and basic medicines to those in need.

MAY 20

Students Fight COVID was started by 250+ MBA/MS 2023 admits from across the world, including HBS, with the aim to fight COVID in India. The initiative offers a unique opportunity for people to donate directly to the organizations fighting COVID on-ground in India in return offering consultations related to the MBA journey, including assisting with GMAT/GRE prep, school selection, application planning, and essay review, all from MBA 2023 admits, current students, and alumni.

The student-focused initiative has collectively raised more than $30,000 in less than 3 weeks, has mentored more than 350 prospective business school and graduate students, and started a fundraiser to procure oxygen concentrators and channel them to those in need in India. “This pandemic is challenging everyone everywhere in the world in unprecedented ways and the consequences are real,” says incoming HBS MBA student Isha Khambra, a member of the Students Fight COVID initiative. “Despite these challenges we—now and in the past—have seen acts of great kindness across the HBS community. Today, me and my fellow Indian community member’s friends, families, mentors, partners are struggling to stay alive, and this is the time to stand up for them just like they supported and invested in us.”

MAY 12

After watching the COVID-19 crisis surge in India in recent weeks, HBS student Shyamli Badgaiyan teamed up with Priyank Lathwal, a Ph.D. candidate at Carnegie Mellon University, to mobilize South Asian student organizations across Harvard and other universities to pool resources for Indian health and aid organizations. The student-focused initiative is working with GiveIndia to channel funds directly to NGOs that have been authorized to supply equipment and supplies to hospitals and COVID care centers in India. By May 12, GiveIndia’s web page was showing a tally of 1,550 donors from 30 different university groups, raising $232,000 toward a goal of $250,000.

MAY 4

Rahul Bajaj (MBA 1964), chairman emeritus of the Bajaj Group, announced that the firm would be donating Rs 200 crore (~$27 million) to address the “on-the-ground challenges” resulting from the surge in coronavirus cases in India. As noted in the Business Standard, the Baja Group previously donated Rs 100 crore to the cause in March of last year. "Through the last 130 years, Bajaj Group has stood strong with communities, government, and local authorities to make a positive difference to society,” said Bajaj. “In the ongoing fight against COVID-19, we all need to come forward in ways more than ever before, to ensure that all citizens of our country have access to healthcare and other necessities of life.”

MAY 2

Garuda Aerospace, led by CEO Agnishwar Jayaprakash (PLDA 25, 2018), is employing his company’s drones to deliver vaccines and medical supplies. Garuda has also used the vehicles to conduct sanitization operations, remotely disinfecting public buildings and hospitals. "The White Knight drones were in R&D for the last two years; we developed and manufactured them in the last two months in readiness to execute aerial delivery of emergency medicines, food and packages,” Jayaprakash told BusinessLine. “Trials were conducted during the lockdown last year in Tamil Nadu and real-time implementation of the drones delivering COVID-19 vaccines looks promising.”

JANUARY 11

Ten years ago, Jeff Feingold (MBA 1997) founded Hope and Comfort, a nonprofit that collects and distributes the most basic hygiene products—including soap, toothpaste, and shampoo—to thousands of children and young adults in need in Massachusetts. “During COVID-19, what we are doing is more important than ever,” says Feingold, who retired from a 23-year career at Fidelity in 2019 and continues to work there part-time as a mentor. Hope and Comfort strives to improve the health, self-esteem, and hygiene education of those it serves. “There are about 250,000 children in Massachusetts that are hygiene insecure. They wake up each day being worried about how they look, smell, or feel, because they can’t afford a simple bar of soap. We want to solve this problem. Unfortunately, the need is great,” Feingold told WBZ-TV. Feingold noted that his organization has distributed more than 1.5 million items during the pandemic. “We are one of the largest of only a few organizations solely dedicated to distributing basic hygiene supplies in Massachusetts,” he says, adding that his goal is to “put ourselves out of business.”

DECEMBER 15

Eighteen months ago, when Bill Hatanaka (AMP 115, 1994) was appointed the inaugural chair of the Board of Ontario Health, the organization set about consolidating 20 major health care organizations and ensuring high-quality care across the system. The arrival of COVID-19, he says, presented “the challenge of a lifetime.” In addition to gaining a deep appreciation of frontline health care providers, says Hatanaka, Ontario Health has worked to build patient-centered offerings based on four areas of focus: patient experience, provider experience, population health, and value. “The knock-on effects of delayed surgeries, delayed treatments, and mental health issues will require a new level of care that will be just as important as with the current pandemic,” observes Hatanaka, who retired from a career in banking in 2018. “I am grateful to learn from the from practitioners, researchers, and educators who are consolidating best practices from countries throughout the world,” he says. “I am also mindful of the practical contributions that those with business backgrounds can make in the delivery of sustainable health care.”

NOVEMBER 24

Anne Miller (MBA 1988) is executive director of Project N95, a national nonprofit founded to get personal protective equipment (PPE) and critical equipment to frontline and health care organizations. Project N95 is a volunteer-led organization with more than 100 volunteers from across the US, Europe, and Asia. The nonprofit matches those who need PPE with verified suppliers who can provide vetted products.

The demand shock to the supply chain in March left many without any access to quality PPE. Project N95 works to break down barriers to access and has delivered more than 2 million units of PPE since mid-May. “I hope that a vaccine will come out and we can declare mission accomplished, but until we know that COVID is really under control, we expect to be here to supply anybody who needs access to PPE and can't get it,” Miller recently told PYMNTS.com. (Readers who know of groups in need of PPE can email Miller at anne@projectn95.org.)

NOVEMBER 23

Cambridge-based biotech Moderna, led by CEO Stephane Bancel (MBA 2000, AMP 170), released promising results on the coronavirus vaccine it is developing. Moderna’s late-stage clinical trial showed its vaccine to be 94.5 percent effective. A vaccine that protects against severe disease would be a “game-changer,” said Bancel, citing “the impact on hospitals, the impact on people’s psyche, and the impact on deaths,” in the Washington Post last week. Moderna projects it will be able to produce 20 million doses by the end of the year. One advantage to the Moderna vaccine is that it does not need ultra-cold storage, making it easier to transport and store. To read more about Moderna and Bancel, visit the HBS Alumni Stories page.

NOVEMBER 17

Connie Baher (MBA 1980), president of US Business Communications, has learned a lot about coping with the isolation caused by COVID-19 from John McCain, Nelson Mandela, and James Stockdale. “My community is under lockdown and I haven't seen my elderly mother since March,” she wrote in USA Today recently. “So I turned to the memoirs of POWs to glean some tips on surviving.” Among the lessons she learned that helped her and her 103-year-old mother cope: you must fight the despair by exercising your mind, keep your emotions in check by taking the long view, and stay connected to others. “The through line for the POWs was courage and grit, to be sure, but they were also sustained by a sense of higher purpose,” writes Baher. “In our modest ways we’re trying to be the heroes of our own daily war. Thanks, John McCain.” Baher, an expert on life transitions, is the author of The Case of the Kickass Retirement: How to Make the Most of the Rest of Your Life.

NOVEMBER 4

Rod Harl (MBA 2000), president and CEO of Alene Candles, led the pivot of his company from candlemaking to the production of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) in response to the pandemic. Closing just before a mandated March 2020 shutdown, the contract manufacturer used their in-house talent in areas of engineering, supply chain, and production to produce nearly 60,000 face shields for first responders, health care facilities, hospitals, and businesses in driving distance of their facilities in New Hampshire and Ohio. “Once we completed the shutdown, we literally woke up the next morning and asked, ‘What can we do to help?’ This is a wartime environment, and businesses need to step forward however they can,” said Harl.

Originally planning to make and sell units at cost, a shield producer in Maine offered to donate materials for 10,000 units, so long as they could receive a portion for their local medical personnel. Following that initial publicity, requests came in from organizations including the Cleveland Clinic, the City of Boston, rural police departments in Ohio, and nursing homes housing employees’ relatives. Seeing existing PPE suppliers were overwhelmed, Alene continued production, providing face shields free of charge to more than 300 organizations across a dozen states. Among the media outlets that featured the effort were ABCs: Pandemic What You Need To Know, The White House Facebook Page, and Coronavirus Impact on local news affiliate WMUR.

OCTOBER 30

The MBA Response, an initiative first launched at HBS as “MBAs Fight COVID” (see April 13 post), provides pro-bono support to 1,200 underserved organizations. With an initial goal of helping organizations impacted by the pandemic, the group has expanded its mission to include a wider group of small businesses and nonprofits that could benefit from MBA talent. Now in the process of hiring an executive director, the nonprofit connects service-minded MBA students from 20 schools with community organizations that need assistance. “Our goal is to mobilize MBA students to address the world’s most pressing issues,” says Sarika Mendu (MBA 2020), one of founders.

Damaris Skouras (MBA 1982) is founder, chairman, and CEO of Olatec Therapeutics, a biopharmaceutical firm. Olatec recently announced it is enrolling patients in a Phase 2 clinical trial of its oral drug, dapansutrile, to treat non-hospitalized patients with COVID-19. Dapansutrile aims to selectively target the immune system’s intense inflammatory response to the SARS-CoV-2 viral infection that can lead to a “cytokine storm.” As such, it is well positioned to prevent patients from progressing into severe stages of the disease requiring hospitalization. Olatec is developing a new class of drugs, known as NLRP3 inhibitors, that target the “causal factor” of the immune system’s cytokine-driven inflammatory response. The company has completed clinical trials in acute gout, heart failure, and osteoarthritis, and preclinical studies in animal models including Alzheimer’s disease, cardiovascular disease, multiple sclerosis, melanoma, and breast cancer. Skouras launched Olatec in 2008 after founding Global Reach Management Company following a decade at Allen & Co. Her two brothers, including Spyros Skouras Jr. (MBA 1980), serve on the board of directors of Olatec.

OCTOBER 26

In January 2020, Meredith Oppenheim (MBA 2001) launched Vitality Society, an online community serving people “60 and better” that puts her 30-year dedication to older people to work engaging, enriching, and energizing this population—a service especially needed given the isolation caused by the pandemic. After two decades in the senior housing industry, which included overseeing a multibillion-dollar portfolio for a REIT, Oppenheim developed a vitality framework built around eight principles, including BE (positive and purposeful), DO (work to remain relevant), GO (travel), and HA (laugh) which inspired and guided her venture. Vitality Society quickly attracted nearly 2,000 members who are taking advantage of live Zoom fitness, wellness, and enrichment classes. In many cases, Oppenheim even hired coaches who are over 50 whose workplaces had been shuttered. She also introduced physical therapy classes every week prioritizing self-care as a critical form of healthcare especially now. “The platform has been elevating members’ spirits by providing much-needed community and support. Now that we’ve validated our B2C model, we are actively forming B2B2C partnerships to maximize our impact on the lives of older people,” says Oppenheim, who often moderates the group conversations before and after classes to foster camaraderie. She also created the Solo Agers and other affinity groups which have monthly Zoom gatherings led by subject matter experts. “The Art and Music groups have evolved into weekly classes, gallery openings, and even a Vitality Society jingle, fully tapping into members’ creativity and curiosity,” says Oppenheim, who has been featured on ABC News, in the New York Times, and on Make Space for Growth, a podcast hosted by Sara Vicente Barreto (MBA 2009). “In the age of COVID, the time has never been more urgent or the need greater to keep older people well and connected,” said Oppenheim, who received a US Congressional Award for her commitment to this often-overlooked and underserved population.

OCTOBER 6

Rajendra Aneja (AMP 175, 2008) brought his expertise in marketing in rural areas to the task of stopping the spread of the COVID-19, which he deems “the biggest and most serious problem facing mankind since World War II.” In India, where Aneja runs a consulting firm, “regional governments should deploy the radio to communicate with rural dwellers, since it has 99 percent reach in India,” he advised in a letter to the editor of theFinancial Times on Sept. 10. In a Sept. 3 letter in The National, he advised “governments should focus on mass testing, so that infection can be detected in the early stages. Masks should be made mandatory. Some social-distancing needs to be enforced. Simultaneously, public and private hospital facilities need augmenting in order to reduce fatalities.” Aneja, a former managing director at Unilever Tanzania, has assembled a list of “Ten Techniques to Defeat Covid-19 in Rural Areas” that includes distributing free masks, involving governing councils, and using “digital weapons" that include awareness campaigns targeted to mobile phones.

SEPTEMBER 30

Robert Wah (AMP 175, 2008), a medical doctor and former president of the American Medical Association, is executive director of CovidCheck.org, a risk assessment tool based on CDC and WHO guidelines. The tool has been deployed in 9 languages across the globe and is used for daily “back-to work/school” screenings at universities and major employers. Wah came to this work as a board member of the Commons Project, a nonprofit that in April launched Common Health, an Android app that allows users to securely download their health information from Electronic Health Records (EHR) and lab sources (similar to Apple Health). The organization has also developed CommonGEO, which displays COVID-19 and other data by geography, and is now working on Common Pass, a platform that will pull clinical information from Common Health and Apple Health to allow travelers to display health status. The goal is to use the information to facilitate air travel and border crossings and Commons Project’s partners include the World Economic Forum, IDEO, airlines, and many government and border operations.

SEPTEMBER 18

Sara Vicente Barreto (MBA 2009) is a corporate strategist whose blog, “Make Space for Growth,” offers insights on personal and business growth. Since March, much of her writing has focused on the pandemic, with topics such as the divisive paranoia of coronavirus; the burdens and blessings of quarantine; and a bucket list for lockdown. In June she launched a podcast focused on finding growth in a crisis. The segments feature women entrepreneurs discussing how they are coping with the pandemic. “I find crisis can create excellent opportunities for cleansing, de-cluttering, and finding new avenues,” writes Vicente Barreto, a native of Portugal who lives in London. Recent guests have included Emily Rasmussen (MBA 2013), founder of Grapevine; Christine Raschke (MBA 2009), an executive coach; and Martina Cusano (MBA 2009), cofounder and CEO of Mukako.

SEPTEMBER 16

In March Reena Jadhav (MBA 1998) launched FreeMeals.org to feed families in need by buying nutritious meals from local restaurants. She was moved by the dramatic rise in food insecurity due to COVID-19 and the desperate state of patients sent home by hospitals with no access to care or food. With the mission statement “no one sleeps hungry in our community,” Jadhav recruited 50 volunteers, including medical doctors and business executives, and signed up 80 restaurants. The Bay Area–based nonprofit, which uses 100 percent of the money raised to buy meals from local restaurants, has donated more than 5,000 meals. Recently they have expanded across the United States using DoorDash in areas without delivery volunteers and partnered with the USDA to deliver fresh produce weekly. They also launched a buy one, donate one (#BODO) campaign. FreeMeals.org’s easy-to-use website allows restaurants to participate and earn $25 for a meal that feeds four people, families to sign up and share their specific need, and donors to support the effort. “This is a time of deep distress for families and restaurants. Through #BODO we feed seniors, the sick, and foster kids while helping restaurants earn more money. Our goal is to sign up 10,000 restaurants across the country,” says Jadhav who is recruiting restaurants, volunteers, and donors.

SEPTEMBER 4

Neel Ghose (MBA 2019) runs the Robin Hood Army, a volunteer-based, zero-funds organization that distributes surplus food from restaurants to community members who are food insecure. The focus of a 2018 case study, the organization recently launched #Mission30M, an effort to address the hunger crisis caused by the pandemic by serving food to 23 million people affected by COVID-19 across eight countries over a six-week period. “The HBS community came together to mobilize civic society,” says Ghose of the endeavor, which reached 170 cities in India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and beyond. “Avinash Pandey (AMP 193) gave wings to the mission by national television coverage across ABP Media's channels, Karan Kapur (MBA 2015) provided hundreds and thousands of meals through his international FnB venture K Corp, Naveen Tewari (MBA 2005) enabled the mission to be displayed in millions of smartphones through disruptive technology at Glance (InMobi), and Nisa Godrej (MBA 2006) enabled food rations to be distributed to cities across India.” Ghose noted, “It’s moments like this when you realize how much of an impact the HBS community can make.”

SEPTEMBER 3

The pandemic has moved much business and personal communication to video conference calls, leaving people with hearing loss struggling to keep up. Shari Eberts (MBA 1995) is helping by urging industry players to provide free automatic captions on their platforms. In April she launched a petition to that end with some 50,000 signatures to date; in response, both Google and Microsoft have made auto-captions available to everyone on their platforms at no extra cost. Eberts is founder of the online community Living With Hearing Loss and has written a free e-book titled Person-Centered Care from the Patient’s Perspective. She has adult onset genetic hearing loss and serves as an advocate for those living with hearing loss.

AUGUST 27

A startup founded by second-year MBA students Shrey Kapoor and Chrys Nikopoulos (both MBA 2021) has helped over 500 self-employed Americans access federal dollars during the pandemic. The pair launched FinGig this spring after seeing how small businesses failed to take advantage of government relief efforts. “We realized that independent contractors and small businesses are disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic because they are more likely to be on the front line with jobs like Uber drivers, owning restaurants, and hair stylists,” Kapoor said in an interview with WCNC. “We’re trying to help as many individuals as possible. There’s a lot of small businesses that need help,” Nikopoulos added. The pair launched their user-friendly website last spring, receiving some help from the Harvard I-lab. “It was a unique setup for both of us—we were attending online HBS classes during the morning hours, and then in the afternoon we were managing a volunteer organization that was experiencing surging demand,” Kapoor noted in an HBS “MBA Voices” blog post. “With all of the negative COVID-19 headlines, it’s easy to get discouraged, but we consider ourselves fortunate that we were able to make a positive difference in the lives of hard-working entrepreneurs,” said Nikopoulos. “Helping our clients was a two-way street and our entire team has learned so much from helping the self-employed and small business backbone of the US economy.”

AUGUST 7

As the effects of the pandemic spread around the world, HBS’s 15 global centers and offices have been instrumental in supporting faculty researching the impact of the pandemic and supporting alumni who have faced unprecedented challenges in its wake. In FY20, the School’s global outposts helped to coordinate more than 50 interviews in 10 countries to further Professor Raffaella Sadun's examination of how resilient businesses can effectively and safely restart as COVID-19 abates. “Thanks to the ingenuity and effort of the research centers, we were able to understand how firms are approaching the tremendous uncertainty related to COVID-19. For many companies, this crisis has created an opportunity to renew their commitment to customers, suppliers, and employees,” Sadun says. “There is tremendous energy across firms.” The centers have also helped connect alumni and friends with fellow alumni, faculty members, and other experts around a variety of issues related to the pandemic. Sadun’s findings are summarized in the report “Re-starting under Uncertainty: Managerial Experiences from around the World.” Additional research related to the pandemic can be found here.

AUGUST 5

From founding LivelyHood, a COVID-relief nonprofit that connects volunteers with requests for essential deliveries; to building a platform to facilitate video consults with mental health professionals; to global distribution of PPE, HBS students are taking advantage of the School’s Summer Fellowship Program to help address the pandemic. The program provides an opportunity for students to develop skills and knowledge while having significant responsibility and high impact. This summer, HBS is supporting a record 162 Social Enterprise Summer Fellows, with many of them working in organizations and on projects focused on COVID-19 response. In a recent blog post, the HBS Social Enterprise Initiative connected with several first and second year fellows to hear about their work. “Being able to see the impact my work is creating on people on a day-to-day basis helps keep me motivated and pushes me to do better than I did the previous day,” said Prerna Arya (MBA 2021), who is working on Swasth, an initiative that aims to democratize access to quality primary care in India.

AUGUST 4

Since early March, Anne DeGheest (MBA 1979) has been posting weekly COVID updates on YouTube. Her science-based “Anne Insights” videos fall into two categories: 1) Epidemiology, which reviews information on infections throughout the world and 2) clinical and business-related issues related to reopening. By leveraging her health care network and employing the latest scientific data publication, DeGheest offers a reliable, nonpolitical picture of the pandemic and its impact on the world. Her goal, she says, is to empower people to make the best decisions to protect themselves and their families. She is the founder of MedStars, a pioneer in the health tech field that works with large health care companies and mentors entrepreneurs who want to change the way health care is delivered. In 2010, she founded HealthTech Capital, a group of private investors interested in health tech startups.

JULY 16

Héctor Masoero (PMD 58, 1989), chair of UADE, a private nonprofit university in Argentina, was inspired by his HBS experience and a recent visit to campus to write a short case study on how UADE responded to the pandemic. After the government’s suspension of in-person classes, Masoero reports, “we began to work frantically to find the best alternatives to continue with the classes, while safeguarding the health of our students, teachers, and employees.” The university pivoted quickly, moving 91 percent of scheduled courses to remote learning. “As with any crisis, new opportunities have been created. This situation has helped us develop an innovative impulse in the ways of teaching that will undoubtedly be very valuable for the post-pandemic stage. The focus on learning, on the student, and on the content will continue to be the key,” he observed. “A new stage of blended education is beginning, and UADE is ready to take advantage of it. We will have strengthened our capabilities and developed sustainable innovations that will allow us to offer better higher education.”

JULY 9

Stephanie Sarka (MBA 1990), founder and CEO of 1 Atelier, recently partnered with Weill Cornell Medicine to develop an N95-like full-face medical respirator mask. They are the only group in the state of New York to develop such a mask. Sarka has converted part of her luxury accessory company's factory and is leading other New York City leather goods and apparel factories to produce 30-50,000 masks per week for Weill Cornell and other hospitals and healthcare organizations. “We did a lot of research on the technical aspects of manufacturing these and of getting the supply chain in place. Now we are coordinating the raw material procurement and production across our network of factories and are bringing on more factories to dramatically scale production,” said Sarka, who launched a GoFundMe page to raise money to support the effort. “We have a highly effective mask that protects both the health professionals and the patients from transfer of microorganisms, body fluids, and particulate matter,” says Sarka, who is submitting the product for an Emergency Use Authorization and FDA and NIOSH certification.

JUNE 26

Speaking at a conference focused on Nigeria’s response to COVID-19, Ndidi Nwuneli (MBA 1999), cofounder of AACE Foods and Sahel Consulting, noted that the country’s agricultural ecosystem was fragile even before the pandemic. “We already have challenges around productivity, infrastructure, post-harvest losses among others,” Nwuneli said, according to a report in Nigeria’sThe Nation. A native Nigerian who lives in Lagos, Nwuneli noted the importance of “reimagining how our market is structured to allow social distancing, [and] thinking through our policy framework because we need a multi-sector and cohesive approach to food. We need to think about how we strengthen our SMEs because they are the bedrock of innovation in the ecosystem globally and [in] Nigeria. Nigeria needs to commit to feeding itself and the rest of Africa.”

JUNE 22

Among the HBS alumni in the Philippines who are working to combat the impact of COVID-19 is Raymond Magpantay (AMP 168, 2005). In an article posted on the HBS Association of Northern California Community Partners website, Magpantay explains that his volunteer work with Community Partners eventually led him back to his home country, the Philippines, where he has helped educate people about the Coronavirus and offer advice on testing and treatment. He’s now involved in “supporting the scaling [of] a COVID-19 testing prototype for faster/quicker testing and turnaround of test results.” The technology is being developed by UPLB (University of the Philippines at Los Banos, Laguna), his alma mater. To read more about alumni who are making a difference in the country’s response to the pandemic, see this article detailing the work of members of the HBS Club of the Philippines.

JUNE 16

Jane Veron (MBA 1991) is founder of The Acceleration Project (TAP), an innovative, award-winning consulting firm focused on underserved small businesses, particularly women and minority-owned enterprises. When the COVID-19 crisis hit, TAP responded by offering free emergency services to any struggling small business. TAP consultants are supporting hundreds of businesses—with guidance on cash flow issues, SBA loan applications, and adaptation strategies. The nonprofit is providing comprehensive support to enable these businesses to recover and prepare to reemerge. TAP, which relies on donor support, recruits consultants with business expertise and a desire to give back. “Our mission from 2012 has become more urgent than ever,” Veron told USA Today. “This enormous disruption is something that impacts virtually all small business owners.”

JUNE 11

Peter Fortenbaugh (MBA 1994), CEO of the Boys and Girls Clubs of the Peninsula, launched an effort to help feed families that have been economically impacted by the COVID-19 crisis. Using two of the organization's locations to serve as pop-up takeout operations, the Clubs are serving more than 2,000 free meals a night. Those receiving the food—at least half of whom are undocumented immigrants—are the low wage Silicon Valley workers who have lost income because of COVID-19, including gardeners, janitors, construction workers, and housekeepers. Funded by donations, the group recently served its 100,000^th meal. "I have two emotions," Fortenbaugh told the New York Times. "I'm really sad. Most of America doesn't realize how hard this is on the low-income immigrant community. But part of me is optimistic and proud we can do something."

JUNE 9

Kanoko Oishi (MBA 1988) is founder and CEO of Mediva Inc., a health care consulting firm in Japan that owns hospitals and clinics that they use as pilot sites to test new ideas. A longtime advocate of remote medicine, Mediva's work in this field has helped Japan's health care industry adapt to the impact that COVID-19 is having on in-person medical appointments. Oishi is a member of the Medical and Care Section of the Japanese government's Deregulation Committee, and she helped craft an emergency act to allow the use of remote medicine. "Our clinics were the first to see COVID-19 patients online," says Oishi. "We are assisting clinics to set up remote medicine systems and operations."

JUNE 8

Annemarie Watson (MBA 2003) and Sean Murray (MBA 2010), who work for two US divisions of testing company Eurofins Scientific Inc, are collaborating on an effort to fight COVID-19 through a suite of tests and data management innovations targeted at employers that include factories, schools, nursing homes, and office buildings. The effort, SAFER@WORK, includes everything from test protocol (who gets tested, how often, etc.), to physician ordering/sample taking, to executing the COVID test, to support for contact tracing. They also have teams of scientists working on technologies that could reduce testing costs and be deployed before the 2020-2021 flu season arrives. "These technical and business model innovations are allowing Eurofins to support lots of businesses, large and small, and have spurred fantastic discussions with local, state, and government agencies which are helping to beat back COVID-19," says Murray. "Pre-vaccine, testing is one of the lowest-cost/highest-return ways to fight the virus."

JUNE 5

As COVID-19 spread throughout the country, Honeywell CEO Darius Adamczyk (MBA 1995) quickly made a commitment to increase its US manufacturing capabilities of critical items at plants in Rhode Island and Arizona. With an unprecedented number of requests and orders for personal protective equipment, the company invested in new facilities to increase production of PPE. Adamczyk, who took the helm at Honeywell in 2017, will discuss how Honeywell, a Fortune 100 company, has confronted the crisis, lessons learned, expectations post-COVID, and the skills he believes are necessary for future business leaders as part of the HBS Healthcare Alumni Association's Virtual Round Table on June 9. Registration is free for HBS alumni.

JUNE 3

During the pandemic Steve Rogers (MBA 1985) has been focused on helping black entrepreneurs cope with the COVID-19 crisis. With financial contributions from the Steans Foundation in Chicago, Rogers is helping struggling black entrepreneurs in the Chicago area access funds from the Payroll Protection Program, a notoriously challenging task for small businesses. As a result of these efforts, the businesses in the project received funding totaling over $1.2 million and were able to re-hire all 900 of their employees.

JUNE 1

Arnel F. Almira, who is currently enrolled in OPM 54, is CEO of Alfa All Food Asia, a B2B distributor of imported fresh frozen meat based in Cebu City, Philippines. "In response to the pandemic and HBS's call to OPMers to be part of the solution, we donated 22 tons of meat to those in need," says Almira. Alfa distributed the donation daily from April 25 to May 7 through its meat shop and mobile outlets.

MAY 28

Ameera Shah (OPM 42, 2012), managing director of Metropolis Healthcare in Mumbai, is on the frontlines of COVID-19 testing in India and recently shared her experiences with the HBS Club of India’s Alumni on Air Webinar Series. Metropolis is a healthcare diagnostics company that was approved by the Indian government to test for COVID-19. After the first case of the virus was discovered in India at the end of January, Shah and her team began to work with the government to figure out how to expand testing. “We were clear that government was not going to be able to fight this fight alone,” Shah said in a conversation with Nishant Sharma (MBA 2006), a managing director of Kedaara Capital. “The magnitude of the problem has been, ‘How do you take nonalignment and execute when everybody is speaking a different language?’”

MAY 27

Interested in helping artists through this difficult time, entrepreneur Sarah Endline (MBA 2001) launched Art Rioting. "I want to democratize the art world with affordable pieces of art," says Endine, the former founding CEO of Sweetriot. Art Rioting allows visitors to support artists by purchasing artwork to be used as digital backgrounds. "I love building sweet movements to fix the world," says Endline, who is currently an Entrepreneur-in-Residence at the Harvard Innovation Lab. "I am building a micro community of art lovers."

MAY 26

As chairman and CEO of Advanced ICU Care, Lou Silverman (MBA 1985) oversees the nation’s largest provider of 24/7 remote in-patient ICU monitoring services. In response to the urgent need for the treatment of COVID-19 patients, Silverman’s group accelerated tele-ICU care launches and clinical capability implementations with both existing and new client hospitals. Advanced ICU Care and partner hospitals joined forces to provide critical care to COVID-19 patients and support for bedside care teams in regions that have been hard hit by the pandemic. Fifty hospitals have added tele-ICU clinical and operational capacity to address the patient surge. “We have had COVID-19–catalyzed discussions with dozens of hospitals, hospital systems, non-hospital healthcare organizations, and governmental entities regarding our services,” says Silverman. Many facilities have leveraged Advanced ICU Care’s services to reduce infection risk for bedside teams and decrease their use of personal protective equipment.

MAY 22

As founder and CEO of Global Citizen Year, Abby Falik (MBA 2008) has a deep understanding of how to develop meaningful experiences for recent high school graduates. Realizing that the global pandemic would be an issue for members of the class of 2020, she launched Global Citizen Academy, a leadership experience designed to equip diverse high school graduates with powerful and practical skills for a lifetime of social impact. "Rather than lamenting the forced 'gap year' so many are facing," says Falik, "let's seize this moment for what it can be: a historic opportunity to launch the generation of leaders our world needs now." High school graduates from around the world are invited to apply to the semester-long program, which begins Aug. 31. The academy, which has a sliding-scale fee, expects participants to spend 10-15 hours a week on courses and projects, exploring topics they are passionate about through immersive courses and independent study.

MAY 20

As founders of Anomalie, a custom wedding dress company, Leslie Voorhees and Calley Means (both MBA 2015) have connections to manufacturers in China as well as to people on the front lines of the COVID-19 pandemic. They decided to use their network to help manufacture and distribute masks to those in need. “We were able to cut out a lot of the cost by being a direct-to-consumer model,” Voorhees told KATU2. The team launched a GoFundMe page and raised more than $30,000 to manufacture and distribute masks. They have distributed tens of thousands of N95 and surgical masks to frontline healthcare workers in 19 states across the country.

MAY 19

Kate Bingham (MBA 1991), a biotech venture capitalist based in London, has been appointed chair of the UK’s Vaccine Taskforce. Bingham will coordinate efforts to find a viable vaccine for COVID-19 and make it widely available to the public, as reported by Bloomberg. “Our immediate aim on vaccines is two-fold: to ensure everyone in the UK that needs to be vaccinated against COVID-19 can be as soon as practicable. Secondly, to ensure adequate global distribution of vaccines to bring the quickest possible end to the pandemic and the economic and social damage it causes,” Bingham said. The UK has committed £250 million ($303 million) to find a vaccine for the virus, and the taskforce will coordinate development efforts already underway across government, industry, and academia.

MAY 18

In March 2020, Christine Y. Zhao (MBA 2002) and several partners—including Nina Tao (MBA 1999) and Seamon Chan (a member of the 2020 OPM cohort)—organized the American Chinese United Care (ACUC) Alliance, a coalition of community organizations in the tri-state New York area with the mission to fight COVID-19 by addressing the shortage of PPE supplies and meeting other emergency needs of medical workers and first responders. The ACUC alliance has 159 members, including Chinese American community-based organizations and businesses, Chinese origin alumni associations, and various Chinese cultural and professional organizations. As of the end of April, ACUC members raised and donated more than $5.8 million in cash, PPE, and meals, primarily to hospitals, senior centers, and first responders in New York, as CBS news and ABC reported. ACUC hosted a COVID-19 webinar on April 16, where 16 doctors from Wuhan, China, shared and exchanged knowledge with over 40 doctors from New York and Connecticut hospitals on COVID-19 diagnosis, treatment, prevention, and hospital management.

MAY 15

Seattle-based venture capitalist Dan Levitan (MBA 1983) recently partnered with his twin brothers, a medical doctor and an entrepreneur, to launch Prone2Help. The nonprofit responds to an observation that for patients who do not need to be intubated, proning—i.e. resting on the stomach—offers a gentler and effective treatment when paired with oxygen delivery. "We believe that improving access to proning will help more COVID-19 patients to breathe while reducing the need and demand for ventilators," says the trio's website, which raises funds to support the manufacturing and distribution of proning cushions that enhance the comfort of patients of all sizes, allow use of oxygenation devices, fit on standard stretchers, and are easily cleaned. As reported in Geek Wire, the brothers and their partners have provided more than 250 proning cushions to some 125 hospitals in 30 states.

MAY 14

Eager to address the challenges brought on by COVID-19, on March 20, sectionmates Raquel Schreiber (MS/MBA 2021) and Brendan Lind (JD/MBA 2023) launched Community V COVID-19, a platform that aggregates high-quality support resources and uses targeted advertising to connect with those who need help during the pandemic. The platform invites users to search by region or need and select "Get help," "Give help," or "Donate," among various categories such as food and supplies, internet and devices, K-12 education, and lost income. By May 1, they had more than 18,000 users across all 50 states and were deploying $11,000 monthly in granted and donated ad spend. Working with several Harvard groups (including alumni), Community V COVID-19 leverages technology to mobilize volunteers to bring food, supplies, technology, and financial assistance to those in need, particularly those who are hard to reach. "Our goal has been to accelerate good wherever we can," says Schreiber, who works with 25 part-time volunteers, primarily from HBS.

Push Health, a California-based telehealth company cofounded by Chirag Shah (MBA 2003), a medical doctor, connects patients with medical providers around the United States and offers access to lab testing, including various types of antibody testing. The Push Health team realized that antibody testing for COVID-19 will likely play a role in helping address the impact of the pandemic, so they quickly leveraged their existing network to enable access to an FDA-authorized antibody test for COVID-19. "There is hope that antibody testing will eventually help discern who has immunity to COVID-19," says Shah. "This knowledge will be valuable for individuals looking to get back to work and for communities looking to keep their residents safe."

MAY 12

Philipp Triebel (MBA 2010), Malte Horeyseck (MBA 2010), and several partners launched a health care think tank in Germany to develop solutions in response to the current pandemic. Its first venture, Rapid Pandemic Response Group, offers end-to-end COVID-19 testing solutions to governments and corporations. Headquartered in Berlin with a footprint across Europe and the Americas via local partners, RPR Group provides the infrastructure, logistics, and digital backbone to run several hundred thousand tests per week. “We develop test regimes based on specific needs of communities, with our first project deploying 2 million tests over the next 90 days for one European country,” says Triebel. “Our vision is to enable a fast, lasting, and safe return to a steady-state economic and civil life for all people in regions that are in lockdown.” The team is interested in partnering with governments needing assistance with scaling up local COVID-19 testing capacity.

MAY 8

As a student at HBS, Kayla Lebovits (MBA 2019) launched Bundle to help working parents juggle the demands of their professional and home lives by providing high-quality activities for children ages 6-11. With so many parents at home with their children due to COVID-19, Lebovits launched “Bundle Breaks” to meet the increasing demand. The virtual, interactive experiences are geared toward kids 4-11 years old, and Lebovits is offering essential workers the breaks at no charge. “Our breaks allow parents to get things done while their children engage in 1:1 virtual and interactive science, engineering, culture, and wellness experiences with our Bundlist instructors,” says Lebovits.

MAY 7

Roslyn Payne (MBA 1970) is board chair of a family foundation working in the areas of education, health, and community development. A few years ago, the foundation partnered with other families to create UpMetrics, a data and analytics social enterprise that empowers nonprofit organizations to share their stories with potential donors. In response to the COVID 19 pandemic, UpMetrics is making its platform free to all nonprofits through the end of 2020. "Nonprofits are really struggling, with many of the traditional fundraising options cut off," notes Payne. "The goal here is to help them get their stories out to existing and potential donors in a way that they control—and can easily change—at no cost," says Payne, whose team created a video to explain the organization’s offerings.

Radha Ruparell (MBA 2008) recently detailed her firsthand experiences with Coronavirus in an article titled "What No One Tells You About Having COVID-19," published on April 23—which was Day 16 of her struggle with the virus. Ruparell has been very sick with the virus, but because she is in New York City, the epicenter of the disease, she was asked to manage symptoms at home. She describes the intense difficulty of maintaining her physical and mental health and presents four lessons learned from the experience, which she anticipates will remain her "guiding lights" long after she has recovered. Learn more.

MAY 6

In his role as executive director of Innovation and Research at LifeBridge Health, Pothik Chatterjee (MBA 2014) recently partnered with Under Armour to produce personal protective equipment (PPE) for the organization's five hospitals in the Baltimore area. As featured on Fox Baltimore, Chatterjee set up a factory within LifeBridge's facilities and managed the labor supply, distribution, QA, and transportation across the healthcare system. "Since we opened our factory on April 1, we have produced 250,000 masks and 15,000 gowns with redeployed labor who are folding the masks and using sewing machines to stitch gowns," says Chatterjee, who is happy to advise others interested in establishing similar partnerships.

MAY 5

With an interest in sharing accurate, practical advice and helping people ensure their personal safety during the current pandemic, the HBS Association of Northern California has hosted a series of weekly Zoom webinars with Dr. David Seftel (MBA 1992). Seftel, a seasoned clinician, is CEO and Chief Medical Officer of Enable Biosciences, a disease diagnosis company based in South San Francisco. Enable is currently developing an improved rapid COVID-19 test with its public health laboratory partners. The seminars are open to club members and are posted on the HBSANC's Facebook page.

MAY 4

Thanks to Dan McCarthy (MBA 1987) and Margarita Montoto-Escalera (MBA 1985), together with several other Harvard College classmates, HBS alumni can now access free COVID-19 help and information from HACH (Harvard Alumni/ae Community Helps), a university-wide grassroots initiative. HACH has pointed over 50,000 Harvard alumni toward vetted, science-based information, including Harvard Medical School's COVID-19 website, and encourages alums with individual questions to request free, confidential, and empathetic one-on-one advice from 60+ health care professional alumni/ae volunteers. To help or be helped by HACH, please email HarvardHelps1636@gmail.com, and let them know your name, email address, your Harvard affiliation(s), and how you learned of this initiative.

Max Anderson (MBA 2009) and his colleagues at Saturn Five recently launched face2face, a nonprofit that is helping get masks to those in need. Their website, face2face.org, allows visitor to order disposable medical masks, with all profits donated to the American Hospital Association's 100 Million Mask Challenge. For each mask ordered, face2face also donates a mask to someone in need. "We started face2face to fight back against the COVID-19 pandemic by getting more masks into the hands of people across the country," say the Saturn Five team, who are also working to get N95 masks and other high-quality personal protective equipment to hospitals.

APRIL 30

As restaurants and small businesses struggle to survive during the pandemic, Bahia El Oddi (MBA 2019) launched CoCaSha.org, a platform that allows female chef-owners around the world to teach cooking courses. "The women are masters of ethnic cooking from their own native country. CoCaSha trains and coaches them to deliver intimate online cooking classes and connects them to people eager to travel the world through the magic of food to learn new ethnic recipes from home," says El Oddi, a native of Morocco. As she expands the offerings of the website, which stands for Connect, Care, and Share, El Oddi aims to "support thousands of women chefs and to delight thousands more individuals across the world. This crisis can either be an end or a new beginning."

APRIL 29

As chairman of Wipro, an Indian multinational, Rishad Premji's (MBA 2005) response to COVID-19 was both practical and humanitarian. On the practical side, he needed to make sure his employees were safe, focus on customers, and limit costs. On the humanitarian side, Wipro (and the Azim Premji Foundation) has pledged $144 million to support pandemic relief efforts in India. Their contributions include providing some 60,000 meals per day, beds for patients, and providing financial relief—with a focus on helping the most disadvantaged people in India. Listen to a conversation with Premji hosted by the HBS Club of India.

APRIL 28

"Why are we all stuck inside?" is a question many parents of young children are currently fielding, and Amalia della Paolera (MBA 2014), a mother of two, decided to help. Her website, whyareweallstuckinside.com, offers a free kit to support parents with fun and educational activities for kids ages 3-8. "This is a survival kit," says Paolera. "The danger is outside, but for those with little kids, the chaos is inside." The activities are designed to be entertaining and easy to complete in almost any setting.

APRIL 27

Susan Tynan (MBA 2003), founder and CEO of Framebridge, a frame shop based in Washington, redeployed her company’s manufacturing equipment to create personal protective equipment for frontline health care workers. Framebridge recently received an order of 30,000 face shields from the state of Kentucky. The company is selling the shields at cost and will soon begin making face masks as well. “This has just brought the light back to us,” Tynan told Washingtonian.

APRIL 24

Led by chairman and CEO Teresa Clarke (MBA 1988), Africa.com launched a free, four-week webinar series on crisis management for African business leaders. With sessions led by HBS faculty members Linda Hill, Andy Zelleke, and Hakeem Belo-Osagie, the offering aims to help the African business community as they navigate the impact of COVID-19. "We are moved beyond words with the generosity shown by African business leaders and Harvard faculty to share their best thinking with other African business leaders on how they are taking companies forward and protecting the communities they serve," Clarke told CNBC Africa. More than 6,000 people registered from 81 countries.

Trina Spear (MBA 2011), cofounder of FIGS, the high-end medical scrubs company, donated 30,000 sets of scrubs to hospitals across the US for those on the frontlines combatting COVID-19. With strong connections to the health care community, FIGS’ other activities during the pandemic include PPE production, donating $100,00 to the Frontline Responders Fund, and assembling and disseminating care packages for health care workers. "It has been an unprecedented time at FIGS. We are shipping scrubs 24/7 to ensure the health care community has what they need to protect themselves. It is our responsibility to support each and every one of them," Spear and her cofounder Heather Hasson told ABC news.

APRIL 23

Brian Astl (MBA 2006) recently retooled his LED lighting company to produce UV-C wavelength lighting, which is used to decontaminate equipment, surfaces, and rooms. “I’ve never seen the team move so quickly to design, develop, and produce a new product,” says Astl, who is president of Toronto’s Lind Equipment. “We went from thinking we were the furthest thing from health care to producing a product that can be used on the frontlines.”

In his pro-bono work as “expert-in-residence” at Rippleworks, Andy Kaplan (MBA 1978) recently led a session to help social venture teams through the COVID-19 crisis. Rippleworks convened 100+ social enterprises to share practical advice on managing and leading through a financial crisis and then posted the lessons gleaned to help a wider collection of organizations. Topics covered include the role of a leader, how to handle layoffs, and cost reduction.

APRIL 22

Several Boston area hospitals and care facilities have received shipments of personal protective equipment (PPE) with help from second-year MBA Sophie Bai (HBS 2020). A native of China who earned a BS in engineering at MIT, Bai is using her social channels to create a new supply chain for high quality PPE. “You really have to look into the bacterial filtration, particle filtration, fluid resistance, the differential pressure, the flammability,” Bai told WGBH. With friends who have access to Chinese factories, Bai has vetted and organized delivery of more than 1.4 million pieces of critically needed PPE.

Sheryl Sandberg (MBA 1995), Facebook’s Chief Operating Officer, launched an emergency fund to support those in need of food during the Covid-19 epidemic. “People don’t have paychecks, which means they can’t buy food. This may be one of the defining moments of our lifetime,” Sandberg told Forbes. She and her fiancé contributed $1 million to launch the COVID-19 Emergency Fund for Feeding Families, partnering with other tech leaders—including Intuit founder Scott D. Cook (MBA 1976)—to raise an additional $6 million.

APRIL 21

Martin Dober (MBA 1998), managing director of Invest Detroit Ventures, recently teamed up with investors and donors to launch the Tech Startup Stabilization Fund, a $3 million fund that will support startup tech companies throughout Michigan that are negatively impacted by the economic crisis caused by COVID-19. The fund will provide loans and investments ranging from $20,000 to $100,000 to qualified, early stage tech and innovation businesses with less than 50 employees that are headquartered in Michigan. “The fund will make quick investments in tech companies to help extend their runway and put them on a path to scale when the downturn subsides,” says Dober.

Kikka Hanazawa (MBA 2002), founder of the nonprofit Fashion Girls for Humanity, is mobilizing fashion industry resources to address the global shortage of PPE (personal protective equipment). After seeing health care workers wearing trash bags on TV, Hanazawa reverse-engineered an isolation medical gown and posted a tutorial on YouTube. She then created patterns for other PPE and posted them for free. “Within three weeks, 35,000 people from 99 countries had watched and downloaded information. Many are rural hospitals, hospice, and nursing homes, and they are asking the community to start sewing for them,” says Hanazawa, whose user-friendly website includes information on where to donate the finished products. “Often fashion seems useless in a crisis, but we are trying to show there’s always something we can do to make a difference.”

APRIL 20

TIBCO Software CEO Dan Streetman (MBA 2000) is working with global organizations to provide real-time visual analytics and data science solutions to gain insights into disparate data sets regarding the spread of COVID-19, the availability of critical resources, and the efficacy of both pharmaceutical and non-pharmaceutical interventions. The company has created a set of free publicly available visual analytic dashboards. "The algorithms highlight the impact of preventative measures on the epidemic curves, including testing and social distancing, plus the ongoing risks and progression of the hotspots,” says Streetman. Users can drill into case and fatality trajectories, track local outbreaks, and estimate the COVID-19 virus transmission in local regions.

Careismatic Brands CEO Mike Singer (PPL 2020) has donated $1 million in scrubs to health care professionals on the front lines across the nation. “So many hospitals are inundated with COVID-19 patients and short of PPE [personal protective equipment]. Their scrubs are getting dirty and contaminated and they need to change those scrubs often. We wanted to get scrubs to nurses on the front lines who really needed them,” Singer told CBS News, noting that they worked through their network of retailers to deliver the donation within ten days

APRIL 17

After he and his wife recovered from COVID-19, Raj Kapoor (MBA 1996), chief strategy officer at Lyft, wanted to advance clinical trials and facilitate blood plasma donations to help fight the pandemic. He recently helped launch WorldWithoutCovid.org, a free public health service for patients and researchers that matches volunteers with opportunities to participate in clinical trials for vaccines, treatments, antibody testing, and blood plasma transfusion. “There are over 470 research trials in need of over 270,000 global volunteers, and we are adding over 20 new trials a day,” says Kapoor. He notes that volunteers “will help us shorten this pandemic and save lives.” Learn More.

To enable more people to connect with children in meaningful ways during this time of social distancing, Max Tuchman (MBA 2012), founder of the virtual reading app Caribu, removed her product’s paywall. “Almost overnight, usage grew 10-fold,” Tuchman told Forbes. She is now seeing the site used as a quasi-babysitting service, enabling grandparents to bond with their grandchildren while parents take breaks to shower or make calls, and as a platform for virtual playdates for kids. Interested in contributing to the effort, AT&T stepped in to offer support so that the service will remain free through May 24.

APRIL 16

Inventor Dean Kamen (OPM 7, 1982) facilitated the shipment of 91,000 pounds of protective equipment to be delivered from Shanghai, China, to New Hampshire. Kamen reached out to his DEKA Research and Development Corp. employees who live in China to ask for help acquiring high-quality masks, gowns, and other medical supplies for New Hampshire health care workers and then worked with FedEx and the State to get them delivered. “Dean Kamen is the hero today,” Senator Jeanne Shaneen told the New Hampshire Union Leader.

Cobalt Robotics recently trained its security robots to support companies whose employees are working during the pandemic. Their robots now check employees’ temperatures for fever using a FLIR thermal camera, remind groups of people to maintain social distance, and detect whether workers are wearing protective masks and gloves. Since March 13, says COO Mike LeBlanc (MBA 2019), Cobalt has deployed over 40 robots in this capacity with more in the pipeline.

Many of the companies owned by Turkey’s Koç Group, whose vice chair is Ali Koç (MBA 1997), are working to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. Arçelik is collaborating with the Turkish government to produce 5,000 life-saving mechanical ventilators by the end of May. Ford Otosan is producing protective face shields, aerosol boxes, and waterproof protective gowns. Tofaş is building biological sampling cabins, intubation cabins, and protective face shields. The Divan Group is hosting health care professionals free of charge at its three hotels in Istanbul, the epicenter of the pandemic in Turkey.

APRIL 15

ID.me, an alumni-run company that simplifies how individuals securely prove and share their identity online, has partnered with Slack to create a private workspace where verified health care providers can share information. Built in response to a call for help from an ER doctor, the Slack channel allows health care professionals to “help each other with smart, actionable, accurate information,” says ID.me cofounder and CEO Blake Hall (MBA 2010), who adds that the company’s technology is also being used by BP gas stations to give health care workers a discount on gas.

Given their expertise in helping employees cope with stress, enterprise wellness platform Whil decided to offer its services free of charge through the end of May. Some 2,000 companies have taken advantage of the offer and have gained access to digital tools to help them cope with the difficulties posed by COVID-19. “I’m proud to represent a team that has worked tirelessly to carry out our mission to help professionals everywhere live healthier, happier lives,” says Whil founder and CEO Joe Burton (PMD 75, 2000).

APRIL 14

Ratan N Tata (AMP 71, 1975), chairman emeritus of the Tata Group and chairman of Tata Trusts, is galvanizing resources to support COVID-19 initiatives. Tata’s affiliates have jointly committed over $200 million. “At this moment, the need of the hour is greater than any other time,” said Tata, who pledged to “to protect and empower all affected communities.” Among Tata’s holdings is the Taj Group of Hotels which has opened up several of its properties free of charge, including its iconic Taj Mahal Palace in Mumbai, for the use of doctors and health care workers on the frontlines of the fight against the pandemic.

In response to the need for protective equipment for health care workers, 3D greeting card maker Lovepop is using its facilities to manufacture face shields. “We’re a company that has access to significant production resources,” co-founder and CEO Wombi Rose (MBA 2015) told BostInno. With the help of Pierce Schiller (MBA 2015), Lovepop created and produced their first product, face shields, with plans to produce up to 40,000 per day. Future products they are pursuing include coveralls, hoods, shoe covers, and isolation chambers. They have also designed a pop-up emergency cot that is disposable and packs flat. Learn more.

Longtime advocate for equity in school funding in the Chicago area, Jennifer Grumhaus (MBA 1994) knew that the people her nonprofit serves would be particularly hard hit by COVID-19. North Chicago Community Partners (NCCP), the group Grumhaus cofounded and leads, has temporarily revamped its business model to distribute emergency food bags, family resource and learning kits, and book bags each week. Working in a community with sparse e-learning options and grocery stores that is suffering from heavy job losses, NCCP is providing much-needed support to students, families, and educators.

APRIL 13

With hospitals throughout New York, the epicenter of the COVID-19 crisis in the United States, desperate for supplies, Clara Wu Tsai (MBA 1993) and the Joe and Clara Tsai Foundation answered the call by donating 2.6 million masks, 170,000 goggles, and 2,000 ventilators. “We kept hearing cries for (personal protective equipment) from our community and wanted to help,” Tsai said in a CNN interview. “It’s our intention to help the most underserved institutions.”

Current HBS students have organized MBAs Fight COVID-19, a coalition of MBA students across the country who can provide help to organizations in need. Offering skills such as budgeting, data crunching, outreach to stakeholders, strategic planning, research, and project management, the initiative matches MBAs with organizations in the public, private, and social sectors.

APRIL 10

Apollo Global Management Chairman and CEO Leon Black (MBA 1975) and his wife, Debra, have pledged $20 million ($10M upfront, $10M in matching funds) to “NYC Healthcare Heroes,” a joint effort with Aramark, the Mayor’s Fund, Robin Hood Foundation, and the Red Cross. “We are honored to do our part to recognize, help, and thank our health care heroes and their loved ones,” said the Blacks when announcing their support. The program will provide at least 300,000 and up to 500,000 packages of shelf-stable food, household cleaning, and personal care products, as well as over-the-counter medicine to staff at hospitals across the five boroughs through June, alleviating the burden of having to shop for themselves and their families.

APRIL 9

Massachusetts COVID-19 Relief Fund was established with $13 million in donations from local philanthropists, many of whom are HBS affiliates. The fund was launched by Massachusetts First Lady Lauren Baker and Joanna Jacobson (MBA 1987), who is president of Boston’s One8 Foundation. “Our message to the people, non-profits, and communities of our state is this: We know you are hurting, and we are here for you,” Jacobson told WWLP. The fund will be used to aid vulnerable populations, such as people facing homelessness, hunger, and the loss of critical services due to COVID-19, and will be distributed to charitable organizations across the state, according to the Boston Globe. Among the donors who contributed seed capital are Jonathon Jacobson (MBA 1987), Beth and Seth Klarman (MBA 1982), Anita and Joshua Bekenstein (MBA 1984), Paul (MBA 1983) and Sandy (MBA 1989) Edgerley, Tristin and Martin Mannion (MBA 1985), Denise Dupre and Mark Nunnelly (MBA 1984), William Helman (MBA 1984), and Jill and Michael Stansky (MBA 1985).

California-based biopharma Humanigen received FDA approval for emergency compassionate use of its Lenzilumab antibody in COVID-19 patients. “The idea is to reduce the morbidity and mortality dramatically until we can develop the tools to prevent and/or mitigate transmission of the virus,” says Humanigen’s Chief Scientific Officer Dale Chappell (MBA 2001), who received his MD at Dartmouth prior to HBS. Humanigen will provide Lenzilumab free of charge to several leading centers.

APRIL 8

As CEO Southern Europe of B&B Hotels, Madrid-based Jairo Gonzalez (OPM 53, 2019) knew that Spanish health workers—and patients—needed something he could provide: accommodations. Gonzalez opened all 33 of the company’s hotels located in Spain to the country’s health authorities, providing 3,300 rooms and 7,000 beds to people affected by COVID-19. “We have health care workers in our Madrid hotels and patients with mild symptoms in our Barcelona hotels,” says Gonzalez. “Most of the doctors staying with us have moved from other parts of Spain to Madrid to reinforce frontline care.” He and his team also launched #AYUDANOSAAYUDAR (#HELPUSHELP), to enlist other companies to donate products and services for the guests.

Interested in helping independent businesses survive the economic impact of COVID-19, Rahim Noormohamed (HBS 2021) launched GIFTforward, a social tech venture to help small businesses by selling gift cards. “The problem facing restaurants and other small businesses is a cash problem. They need cash today to help pay bills since they're not selling any food. Buying a gift card puts money in the hands of a small business immediately,” Noormohamed told Forbes.

APRIL 7

Led by Andrea Silbert (MBA 1992), the Massachusetts-based Eos Foundation is fighting hunger during the COVID-19 crisis. The private foundation has pledged $1 million in emergency grant funding to support non-profits throughout the state that provide food and help citizens register for SNAP benefits. Eos is providing grants and partnering with school districts and youth agencies to tap into the USDA emergency meals program, which reimburses food costs for any school district to open an emergency feeding site for children and youth ages 0-21. Eos is committed to the "nutritional safety net" during this crisis, Silbert says. "Hunger should not be an issue we struggle with during this crisis. We have the food and the systems to easily feed everyone. Now we just need the funding from the federal government."

With so many people working from home, Open Sesame, a corporate e-learning firm in Portland, Oregon, is offering free access to courses that help companies educate their employees about preventing the spread of coronavirus, work and manage remotely, and convey the importance of social distancing. Cofounder and CEO Don Spear (MBA 1986) notes that e-learning can provide a critical and efficient path to rapidly educate employees and provide up-to-date information.

Missy Narula (MBA 2007), Founder and CEO of Exhale Parent, is helping parents navigate the resources available to them as they scramble to homeschool their children, with a goal of reducing the burden on parents while inspiring ideas for education at home.

APRIL 6

Natalie Guo (MBA 2018) has launched a nonprofit to feed frontline health care workers while supporting restaurants during the COVID-19 crisis. Boston-based Off Their Plate channels donor funding to restaurants that prepare nutritious meals for those who work in health care. Now expanding to San Francisco, LA, NYC, and Pittsburgh, the grassroots initiative provides 10 meals and restores 3 restaurant employee shift hours for every $100 donated. With the restaurant community struggling to keep their staff, Guo told WCVB that the organization is giving health care workers “what they need to power through these long 12-hour, 18-hour marathons at the hospital.”

With a goal of “spreading the promise, not the virus,” Aaron Poynton (AMP 195, 2018) launched COVID Promise, a grassroots nonprofit asking individuals and businesses to pledge to rebuild the economy during and after the COVID-19 crisis. Once we are through the worst of the virus, says Poynton, “We need a plan to get back on our feet. Together, we will restore the economy and we will be stronger than ever.”

APRIL 2

Patriot Nation: Robert Kraft (MBA 1965) and Jonathan Kraft (MBA 1990) play a key role in delivering more than a million N95 respirator masks to Massachusetts.

Eric Slesinger (MBA 2021) is addressing the shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE) at hospitals by manufacturing two kinds of face shields. Slesinger has teamed up with a handful of engineers, doctors, and designers to prototype, manufacture, and distribute a simple face shield and a disposable PAPR shield component that health care providers can wear while working with patients with COVID-19. “We engineered a replacement shield based off a cell phone photo and produced samples in three days,” says Slesinger. “Doctors at a large Bay Area, CA, hospital were blown away when they tested it, so we’re currently working to scale production to get them more as fast as we can” For more information or to support this effort, visit hfdc.us.

APRIL 1

Joint degree student Kirby Erlandson (MD/MBA 2020) has been named to Cambridge’s COVID-19 Expert Advisory Panel to advise the city on planning and response efforts. The Crimson notes that Erlandson “spent two years in Liberia designing public health responses to the then-ongoing Ebola epidemic.”

MARCH 30

Andrew Slavitt (MBA 1993), founder of Project N95.org, a medical clearinghouse matching donors and sellers of medical equipment to hospitals in need, is tracking the spread of the virus on a state-by-state basis. “We have the power in our hands to slow down the spread of this disease. I’m 53 years old. I wasn’t alive during World War II. I was never asked to sacrifice. If the hard part is spending six to 10 weeks at home to arrest the spread of this, so we can save hundreds of thousands of lives, count me in.” Q&A from the St. Paul Pioneer Press.

Paul Pickering (MBA 2004) leads Ubiquitome, a New Zealand-based biotech, has pivoted to providing a mobile Coronavirus test option. “The coronavirus outbreak is showing signs of being the long-feared outbreak that finally outruns the static testing model that was already creaking at the seams with previous outbreaks such as H1N1 and SARS. As such, we are reorienting our business to prioritize support for groups seeking the kind of dynamic, mobile coronavirus detection capabilities unique to the Liberty16.”

MARCH 25

Harvard’s Wyss Institute, named for Hansjörg Wyss (MBA 1965), announces new initiatives to help aid in care, advance treatment, and accelerate vaccines to address the coronavirus. "With our highly multi-disciplinary and translation-focused organization, we [the Wyss Institute] were able to quickly pivot, and refocus our unique engineering capabilities on much needed diagnostic, therapeutic, and vaccine solutions, and we hope to be part of the solution for many of the innumerable problems the present pandemic poses," said Wyss Institute Founding Director Donald Ingber.

David Frankel (MBA 2003) of Founder Collective discusses his coronavirus diagnosis with the Boston Globe, also noting that he “sees big potential for innovations in fields including teleconferencing and touchless public accommodations, but believes the biggest change coming from the crisis might be a shift in public attitudes about the monitoring and sharing of real-time health data.”

MARCH 22

Anand Mahindra (MBA 1981) has pledged funds and his company’s manufacturing capabilities to produce ventilators for India. “We need to create scores of temporary hospitals and we have a scarcity of ventilators. To help in the response of this unprecedented threat, we at the Mahindra Group will immediately begin work on how our manufacturing facilities can make ventilators.”

MARCH 20

Clover founder and CEO Ayr Muir (MBA 2004) began offering at-home cooking lessons for those living under quarantine. You can find his YouTube channel here.

MARCH 19

Entrepreneur and investor Halle Tecco (MBA 2011) pledges to give $10,000 to “to up to five small non-profits to cover immediate needs.” “I'd like to be more helpful right now, and think the best thing I can do is support others working on the ground.”

Bill Berrien (MBA 2002), CEO and owner of Pindel Global Precision, pledged to “produce ventilator components at cost until the pandemic is over” according to a story in Greater Milwaukee Today. “All the technology is there. We can offer really quick turnaround (and) only charge for cost of material and tooling,” Berrien told the site. “(We’re) happy to go open book on it.”

MARCH 18

Khan Academy founder Sal Khan (MBA 2003) announced plans to help students and parents navigate the new norm of distance learning. Read more about his work here.

MARCH 16

Moderna, led by CEO Stéphane Bancel (MBA 2000, AMP 170), announces the first testing of its coronavirus vaccine. Bancel and Moderna joined a wider effort by researchers from Harvard and other local higher ed institutions to combat the spread of the coronavirus.

FEBRUARY 6

HBS alumni join forces to combat virus outbreak in China. One alumni group, calling itself the Wuhan Task Force, aims to rapidly provide much-needed medical protection items to hospital and response personnel, while another seeks to raise funds from HBS alumni to support the families of victims of the virus.

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