Roy Bahat

Roy Bahat is the head of Bloomberg Beta, an early-stage venture firm backed by Bloomberg that invests in startups making work better. It was the first venture fund to focus on investing in the future of work, and in artificial intelligence.

Bloomberg Beta connects the technology community to other walks of American life: Roy is a commissioner on the California Governor’s Future of Work Commission (following a collaboration between Bloomberg and New America to understand the 10-20 year future of technology’s effect on work in America). Roy organizes the “Comeback Cities” tours, where he leads groups of venture capitalists and members of Congress to cities around America to learn about startups outside the coasts. With Stanford PACS and Schmidt Futures, Roy organized First Principles, a community for people in technology to learn how to give, philanthropically and politically.

Before starting Bloomberg Beta, Roy co-founded a venture-backed company and worked at News Corporation. In addition to founding startups and working as a corporate executive in media, he has served in government (in the office of the New York City Mayor), academia (as a lecturer for a decade at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business), professional services (early in his career at McKinsey & Co.), and nonprofit (leading a student volunteer nonprofit, Phillips Brooks House Association, and advising the Center for Investigative Reporting and the Economic Security Project).

Roy was named one of Fast Company’s Most Creative People in Business. He graduated from Harvard College and was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University studying economics.

Roy lives in San Francisco with his wife Sara, who runs the MBA program at California College of the Arts and is active at the intersection of political activism and culture, their two kids, and a cliché Golden Retriever.

Positions Held
At Haas since 2011
2013 – Present, Head, Bloomberg Beta
2011 – Present, Lecturer, University of California, Berkeley, Haas School of Business
2012 – 2015, OUYA, Inc., Co-Founder and Chairman
2007 – 2012, President, IGN Entertainment
2006 – 2007, Vice President, News Corporation
2003 – 2005, Director of International Strategy, NYC2012
2002 – 2003, Senior Policy Director, Office of the Mayor, New York City
2000 – 2002, Associate, McKinsey & Co.
Honors and Awards
- Rhodes Scholar, Fast Company’s Most Creative People in Business

Education

• Stuyvesant High School 1990 – 1994
• Harvard University A.B. Social Studies (sic) 1994 – 1998
• University of Oxford M.Phil. Economics 1998 – 2000