Komal Dadlani (Santiago, Chile, 1989)

Komal is the daughter of parents of Indian origin, who initially arrived in Arica and later moved to Santiago. Her father Kishan Dadlani is a merchant and her mother died when she was studying at the university.

Part of her education was done at Colegio San Gabriel, where she had access to a laboratory and met professors who inspired her to follow the scientific route. 

Komal studied Biochemistry at the University of Chile and later followed a master’s degree in the same area and university. In 2013, Komal, together with Álvaro Peralta (computer science engineer) and Isidro Lagos (biochemist) founded the firm Lab4U. The idea was born when they learned the figures from the Inter-American Development Bank, that 88% of schools in Latin America do not have science laboratories.

In 2016 they debuted with the physics laboratory, which has been used by Chilean schools and in classrooms in the United States. That same year, thanks to the support of the video game company Zynga -one of the investors in the venture-, they opened an office in Silicon Valley to promote new businesses.

In 2015, the Cartier Women’s Initiative Awards, which is presented annually to the six women entrepreneurs in the world, went to Komal Dadlani. This year, along with two other entrepreneurs, she won Toyota’s Mothers of Invention Award, where they highlighted their goal to “democratize science so that more students become scientists, researchers, and developers.” Also, in 2017 she was awarded by the MIT magazine, Technology Review of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in the category of “Visionaries” where young people who see the world through a different prism than the rest of the people discover new and powerful uses for technologies.

In 2020, she received the news that their startup was selected to enter the Morgan Stanley acceleration program, becoming the first Chilean firm of its kind to receive an investment from the American giant.

From its headquarters in New York -where Lab4U now has a workspace-, the financial company promotes a Multicultural Innovation Laboratory that supports startup founders from around the world. One of its main focuses is to seek to diversify the entrepreneurial profile, for example by promoting female inclusion.