RINAUDO
Keller

• 1. Education
• 1.1. Early education
• 1.2. College and internships
• 1.3. MBA

Keller C. Rinaudo is an American robotics and autonomous airplane entrepreneur and the CEO and a co-founder of Zipline.

Zipline began drone deliveries in Rwanda in late 2016, and primarily delivers blood to urgent medical situations. In addition to whole blood, the drones deliver platelets, fresh frozen plasma, and cryoprecipitate. As of May 2019, more than 65% of blood deliveries in Rwanda outside of the capital city Kigali use Zipline drones.

In Ghana, the company began using drones in April 2019 to deliver vaccines, blood, and drugs.

He was also the CEO and a co-founder of Romotive, a former company established in 2011 with Kickstarter funding that made inexpensive small robots that use mobile phones as their computing system, machine vision system, and wireless communication system. Romotive essentially shut down in 2014 and morphed into Zipline. Rinaudo presented a TED Talk about Romotive in April 2013 and another in November 2017 about Zipline.

Education

Early education

Keller attended North High School in Phoenix Arizona, receiving an IB diploma and being named a National Merit Scholar.

College and internships

Rinaudo is a graduate of Harvard University, where he was the founder of the Harvard climbing wall. The wall was initially founded by Rinaudo with help from Harvard Business School student Karl R. R. Kuryla as a relatively primitive construction in Lowell House in 2006, and was later upgraded and reopened in the Quadrangle Recreational Athletic Center in 2017.

While a student, Keller built computers out of RNA and DNA that he said could operate in human cells as "molecular doctors". He published this research in Nature Biotechnology, becoming one of the youngest first authors in that publication's history.

Keller graduated from Harvard magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa with a 3.9 GPA and was designated a Harvard College Scholar for superior academic achievement both freshman and sophomore years and also won the Detur Book Prize (top 5% of the class).

While in his undergrad at Harvard, Keller spent several summers (2006–2008) working at the management consulting firm, Boston Consulting Group (BCG). He signed a full-time offer at BCG following his junior year internship to return to the firm following graduation (for fall of 2009). During his time at BCG, Keller "Conducted in-depth financial analysis of 140 competitors in the engineering construction industry and co-wrote new international strategy for a US company with $8B in revenue."

MBA

In his senior year at Harvard, Keller was also admitted into Harvard Business School (HBS) for the class of 2013 - through the 2+2 program. However, Keller ultimately chose not to attend HBS due to the success of Romotive.