Doris Lee (Ph.D. ’21), who is 26, was featured on Forbes’s “30 Under 30” list for enterprise technology in 2023. Her company, Ponder, was founded while studying at Berkeley and helps data scientists clean and summarize their data using automation. Since then, as CEO, she and the company have raised $7 million from VC firms. We spoke to Doris about the company and her experience with the I School.
“At Ponder, we develop easy-to-use data science tools that help data teams work with data at all scales,” Doris said. “After our launch in March, we continued to innovate and make significant advances in our technology to meet data scientists where they are, instead of having to change the way they work.”
She continued, “Our team has also grown significantly — more than doubling our headcount in the past year. I'm proud of the team we've built and grateful for the opportunity to work with amazing people every day.”
Lee, who is also a UC Berkeley undergraduate alum launched Ponder with with her dissertation advisor, School of Information Associate Professor Aditya Parameswaran, and UC Berkeley Berkeley EECS Ph.D. alum Devin Petersohn.
“The I School is highly interdisciplinary,” Lee shared, when asked how the I School has influenced her. “At the I School, I saw how diversity in expertise, background, and experience creates a breeding ground for great ideas and challenges us to think outside the box and solve problems from different perspectives. This has been a big inspiration for me as we are looking to grow our team with diverse talent.”
