Ando Shah

ando headshot 2022-Hearts to Humanity Eternal

Ando designs and evaluates information systems and finance mechanisms that monitor and reward climate and biodiversity positive interventions. He is currently a PhD student at UC Berkeley and an Innovation Fellow at Open Earth Foundation. In past lives, he has worked as a systems engineer, mixed-media artist, virtual reality pioneer, entrepreneur and filmmaker. Trained as a chip designer, he spent his formative years working in silicon valley designing hardware for video streaming and off-grid renewable energy systems for communities in east Africa. He created one of the first 360 video capture cameras, created and directed multiple VR experiences that were selected at Cannes Film Festival, Sundance Film Festival and others. He co-created the world’s first underwater camera trap and software identification system that was used to automatically identify individual manta rays. Ando was the co-founder and Chief Technology Officer of Ballast Technologies and created the field of aquatic virtual reality to study the effects of ‘virtual nature’ on the human brain, and build empathy for the ocean. He holds multiple patents in these fields and has been featured in the New Yorker, CNET, The BBC, Forbes, Discovery, Digital Trends, MIT Technology Review, WIRED, and Freethink amongst others.