VIP-X in San Francisco is an accelerator open to Penn alumni and student entrepreneurs in the Bay Area who are founders or leaders of early-stage ventures. This four-month program runs twice per year, in the fall and in the spring. The company must have traction, and the team must be based in the San Francisco Bay Area during their time in the program.

Alberto and Gay Peisach Mentoring Initiative
- Knowledge of business fundamentals
- Validated product-market fit
- Measurable traction (i.e., revenue)
- Necessary expertise on the team
- Be part of a community of entrepreneurs and advisors who will optimize your startup’s potential.
- Receive expert advice on how to navigate your startup’s unique challenges and opportunities with one-on-one advising.
- Connect with a network of alumni entrepreneurs who will inspire and motivate you.
- Get feedback during biweekly group advising sessions with advisors, including VCs, angel investors, attorneys, experts, and successful entrepreneurs.
- Access co-working space at Wharton San Francisco.
Spring 2023 Program Cycle Calendar
Monday, December 12th: Application Opens via Survey Monkey Apply
Monday, January 16th: Application Closes via Survey Monkey Apply
- Live Pitches @WSF: Fri, Jan 27 invited ventures assigned a time slot between 9 am-12:00 pm PT
All group sessions run from 7:30 AM-9:30 AM PT. followed by 1:1 Advising Sessions. 100% Participation is required.
- Friday, Feb 24th: Kick Off Mtg and lunch w. Alumni Session 1:
- lunch from 12:30-1:30pm PT.
- lunch from 12:30-1:30pm PT.
All group sessions run from 7:30 AM-9:30 AM PT. followed by 1:1 Advising Sessions. 100% Participation is required.
- Friday, March 10: Session 2
- Thursday, March 23: Session 3
- Friday, April 14: Session 4
- Thursday, April 20: Session 5
All group sessions run from 7:30 AM-9:30 AM PT. followed by 1:1 Advising Sessions. 100% Participation is required.
- Friday, May 12th: Session 6
- Thursday, May 25th: Session 7
All group sessions run from 7:30 AM-9:30 AM PT. followed by 1:1 Advising Sessions. 100% Participation is required.
- Thursday, June 8th: Wine Chat
- 5:30-7:30p.
- Friday, June 9th: Session 8
Fall 2022 Cohort
Mike Mitchell W’09, Founder
We work with artisanal fishermen in Mexico and the US to turn hated, invasive fish species into pet treats that are good for both pets and the environment.
Arzan RaimalwalaWG'13 W'14, Lauder, Founder
Home Furniture 3 way marketplace: brands, designers and consumers.
John Foye, MT’13, Founder
Aakash Ahamed, CTO
Working Trees gets farmers paid for growing trees through carbon markets.
Patrick Ryan WGMP’21, Co-Founder
Annie Brown, Co-Founder
A subscription-based clean mascara. The Dollar Shave Club for mascara.
Vasanth Mohanraj W’08, Founder
Stemming from a public health initiative to build evidence-based tools during the COVID pandemic, we launched our first product to mitigate risk, SIP – an airtight drinking valve that automatically seals after each sip, allowing the immunocompromised and COVID-conscious to safely drink in public spaces without removing their mask or compromising their health.


VIP-SF fills a critical gap in startup education that sits between case studies in the classroom and pounding the pavement as a startup founder. The needs and questions in a startup change so frequently and good advice is hard to find because it needs to be relevant to sage and industry. Taking well-meaning advice from a Series B mentor/investor when you're a Seed sage company can kill a business. VIP-SF gave Hostfully a supportive community where we could ask questions of faculty, advisors, and peers who understand the unique challenges of starting a company from the ground up.
VIP helped LuxCreo to: Better structure our organization for alignment and performance, streamline our go-to-market strategy, and focus our mission (3D "Production"). The value of VIP extends far beyond the program. Besides ongoing interactions, referrals and promotions through the Wharton alumni network have been invaluable. Highly recommend the program!
We sold the company to Accenture early this year. It would not have happened without the training and skills we gained at the VIP Program.
When I joined the VIP-SF experience, I was not ready to be a founder. After working in consulting pre-Wharton, I did not know what entrepreneurship truly meant. With guidance from VIP and tapping into its resources, I grew and grew. After a pivot, I finally settled into my role as COO of a company that grew to$13M in revenue in 2020. I became more confident in myself.
The program really pushed us to think through many aspects of our business, including articulating our value offering, revisiting our pricing policy, developing our sales strategy, and many other critical issues. Besides receiving candid feedback and sound practical advice, going through the program added a great deal of credibility to our startup.
It is a great experience, even virtually, as you get one-on-one coaching from two experienced Wharton professors - one focused on entrepreneurial marketing and another from a seasoned investor perspective. The cohort is also a great sounding board and the meetings allow you to test out new ideas and messages in a safe, supportive environment.
VIP-X SF Info Session
Media Mentions
A block from the Bay Bridge, Wharton San Francisco is located in the historic Hills Brothers Plaza. Our Bay Area campus is a hub of academic and entrepreneurial activity for Wharton students and alumni in the West Coast region.

Previous Cohorts
- Arcons Technology Inc. (Hemant More, WG’04; Archana More)
- Jump Writing (Hans Hartvickson, WG'08)
- Lex (Pranav Pillai, ENG'20; GEN'20; W'20)
- MakersHub (Charley Howe, WG’20; Phong Ngo, WG ’20)
- KYTE (Han Choi, WG’21; Irfan Usman)
- Kiv Broker (JB Duler, WG'94; Matthieu Jabbour)
- 2Sigma School (Vishal Goenka, WG'14)
- Brightfox (Alex McCauley CAS'04)
- Munchrooms (Gina Shi, W'19)
- CivilGrid (Josh Mackanic, WG’18; Brandon Cohen, WG’18)
- AnimalBiome (Carlton Osborne, C’92; Holly Ganz)
- CarBevy (Joseph Wirija, WG’22; Hemant Jain, WG’22)
- Gestoos (Todd Stein, WG’93)
- Castle Analytics (Peter Eberle, WG’13; Brian Friel, Dan Hoover, Dan Serfaty, John Akapo)
- Fibulas (Ying “Shirley” Pan, C’14; Xiaotian Ma)
- Ilekun Health (Tobi Bosede, C ’11)
- Zebel (Hamid Hajian, WG’18; Ramtin Kermani)
- FarmTogether (Artem Milinchuk, WG’12)
- Fluid Biomed (John Wong, WG’20, WEMBA)
- Haldi (Julia Huang, WG’11; Simran Kalra)
- MyNurse.ai (Wayne Pan, WG’07; Waleed Mohsen)
- Superkin (Miriam Williams, WG’15; Tara Henning)
- Archer (Thomas Foley, WG’20; Fred Canney, WG’20)
- Luminal (Sam Ribnick, C’11)
- LuxCreo (Mike Yang, WG’04; Michael Strohecker, WG’04; Steven Lee, ENG’14; Michael Hodge)
- Relayto (Alex Shevelenko, C’97; W’97)
- Eclipse (Phong Ngo, WG’20)
- Gridline.ai (Mike Lunati, WG’13; Marc Suter; Ramin Ghelichi; Demtrios Kellari)
- Inscribe Labs (John McDowell, WG’11)
- ISO Thrive (Lyn Oswald, W’80; Jack Oswald; John Selling)
- Love, Sylvie (Kristen Dumbeck, WG’20)
- Olori (Tomide Awe, WG’17)
- Kasa Living (Roman Pedan, ENG’10, W’10)
- AMPAworks (Bianca Gonzalez, NU’08, WG’19; Flora Chang, WG’19; Janak Agarwal, WG’19)
- Workplace Hospitality Management (Daniel Doyon, W’06)
- Wolox (Marina Ibarra, WG’12)
- Zoba Life (Alice Zhang, WG’08)
- Boon VR (Ridhima Parvathaneni, ENG’13, W’13)
- Canary Technologies (Harman Narula, WG’15; SJ Sawhney)
- DocCheer (Michael Jue, ENG’03; Nicholas Ng, ENG’03, GEN’04)
- LifeSaver (Ted Chen, W’87, L’91; Mike Demele)
- Bear Flag Robotics (Igino Cafiero, WG’17; Aubrey Donnellan)
- ClozeLoop (Cory Bray, W’06; Hilmon Sorey)
- Hostfully (David Jacoby, W’01; Margot Schmorak)
- Kinima.fit (Daniel Judd, ENG’14, W’14; Renee Migdal, WG’83)
- LadyMarry (Joanne Jiang, WG’13)
- Novi Bank (Philip Cortes, WG’11)
- Pivot Health Company (Tony Campos, WG’16)
- SitterFriends (Fahad Jalal, WG’12)
- BreachRx (Alonzo Ellis, WG’17; James Green, WG’17; Anderson Lunsford, WG’17)
- InnaMed (Ronald AngSiy, WG’17)
- Spotful (Edward Jiang, WG’17; Gandis Mazeika, WG’17)
- Stayz (Evan Drake, WG’17; Justin Cleveland)
- Novoloop (Miranda Wang, C’16)
- Qorum, Inc. (Andrew Pietra, WG’17)