Inaugural Lam-Larsen Distinguished Lecture Series - with Martin Chavez, Vice Chairman, Sixth Street, and Chris Larsen (BS, '84) Co-Founder & Executive Chairman, Ripple

On Tuesday, October 31, 2023, join us for the Inaugural Lam-Larsen Distinguished Lecture Series event, featuring a Fireside Chat with Martin Chavez, Vice Chairman of Sixth Street, led by Chris Larsen (B.S., '84), Co-Founder and Executive Chairman of Ripple, Inc.

The event will be held at the Seven Hills Conference Center, 800 Font Blvd., located on the San Francisco State University campus.

Event Program:

• Noon: Welcome Remarks and Networking 
• 12:30 p.m.:  Fireside Chat with Martin Chavez, Vice Chairman, Sixth Street, led by Chris Larsen (BS, ‘84), Co-Founder and Executive Chairman, Ripple
• 1:15 p.m.:  Audience Q&A
• 1:30 p.m.:  Reception with refreshments at Coit Lounge
• 2 p.m.:  Program concludes

Discussion Topics: 

• Personal and educational journey
• Advice for students
• Trends in the investment landscape

Registration is required by Oct. 24th at 5 p.m. to attend this event.

R. Martin Chavez Biography

Martin Chavez is Vice Chairman of Sixth Street, a leading global investment firm. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of Alphabet Inc. In addition, he serves on the fiduciary or advisory boards of Abacus.AI, Cambrian Biopharma, Datavant, Earli, Ketch, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Recursion Pharma, Stanford Medicine board of fellows, and the Stanford Center on Longevity. Martin previously served as President of the Board of Overseers of Harvard University.

Prior to joining Sixth Street, Martin served in a variety of senior roles at Goldman Sachs, including Chief Information Officer, where he oversaw the firm's 9,000 engineers; Chief Financial Officer, and global co-head of the firm’s Securities (now Global Markets) Division. He was also a partner and member of the Goldman Sachs Management Committee. Martin was one of the first developers of SecDB, an early platform that transformed the trading business into a software business. He retired from the firm in 2019.

Prior to joining Goldman Sachs, Martin was the CEO and co-founder of Kiodex, and Chief Technology Officer and co-founder of Quorum Software Systems.

He holds an A.B. magna cum laude in Biochemical Sciences and an S.M. in Computer Science from Harvard University, and a Ph.D. in Medical Information Sciences from Stanford University.

Chris Larsen Biography

Chris Larsen is Executive Chairman of Ripple’s board of directors. He is a co-founder and former CEO of Ripple, a blockchain company he co-founded in 2012. Chris is a pioneer in blockchain and cryptocurrency technology, creating a global decentralized network called RippleNet that uses the digital asset, XRP, to facilitate payments across borders and financial networks. Prior to Ripple, Chris co-founded and served as CEO of Prosper, the first peer-to-peer lending marketplace, and E-LOAN, a publicly-traded online lender that helped democratize lending and finance. During his tenure at E-LOAN, he pioneered the open access to credit scores movement by making E-LOAN the first company to show consumers their FICO scores. 

In 2019, San Francisco State received the largest digital donation ever to a U.S. university courtesy of Chris, his wife Lyna Lam, and Rippleworks, the nonprofit organization he co-launched in 2015. The donation established the Lam Family College of Business as a hub for innovation and entrepreneurship.

Chris earned his Bachelor of Science degree in Accounting and Business Administration from San Francisco State University.

Reasonable accommodations: This event welcomes persons with disabilities and will provide reasonable accommodations upon request. Please send an email to Marcelyn Brogan Potter at mbpotter@sfsu.edu at least 7 days before the event to request reasonable accommodations and include the event name in your email.