Meet our team: Parina Mehta, Intern

What is your professional background and experience?

I join Rio from a mainstream finance background, having studied a Bachelors in Finance from Hult International Business School in San Francisco and London. I have also achieved a Masters in Finance from UNSW, Sydney, whereby I immediately started working in the Philippines as a Financial Consultant looking into M&A and working closely to develop Philippines’s first local stable coin. This is where I found my passion for blockchain and soon started working as an associate in Abu Dhabi, consulting governments in the Caribbean Islands and Middle East on how to incorporate blockchain for improved governance.

Through my work, I was able to curate blockchain adoption strategies for countries which led me to return to London for my second master’s at UCL, where I studied Financial Technology and Machine Learning. The more I learnt how to structure data, the more I wanted to get involved in data-driven roles and soon started working as a Data Scientist for a VC in London, where I picked up on various project management skills before joining Rio.

Why did you decide to join Rio?

The Rio platform perfectly blends all the skills I have picked up through my education and work experiences. Rio works with ML, AI and sustainability and I am very interested to see how my skills as a financial consultant can be utilised to bring real changes by working with our clients.  

Moreover, I was curious as to how I can work with clients and projects to improve and, ultimately, optimize long-term returns whilst retaining sustainability at their core. Rio has given me the platform to allow for value creation for clients through focusing on ESG.

Why and how did you get into sustainability?

I first learnt about the importance of sustainability when I returned to  London to study my second masters. I began working in a London-based asset management firm where, as an analyst, I would perform valuation models for companies that kept ESG at their centre. All investments we recommended were sustainable and I noticed a growing trend in companies and investors placing more emphasis on ESG factors when deciding where and how to invest; the goal being not just mere profits but also promoting positive societal impact and social responsibility through the investment. With this, I found myself actively studying sustainable finance and discovered the importance of ESG.

What achievement are you most proud of?

I am very proud of the all the opportunities I was able to make the most of. I moved abroad at 15, and in the past nine years I had the chance to live in five countries. One of my memorable achievement was to study at Yale University at 15 and then eventually graduating with my masters from Australia before my 21^st birthday. And, of course, all the happy memories that were created traveling to different parts of the world whilst studying and working.