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DBH’s $3,000 lesson in the real world
At San Jose State, Dwight Bentel & Hall Communications puts students in charge of real client campaigns. A Chevrolet brief, a theatre production and a campus sustainability program reveal what that education looks like when it leaves the classroom.
Mohamed Badawy
Mohamed Badawy is the founder and CEO of Scalvy, an Austin-based hardware startup building modular 'Power Neuron' electronics that replace centralized inverters, chargers and DC-DC converters in electric vehicles, energy storage and AI data centers. A former tenured associate professor at San Jose State University who founded and directed its Center of Power Electronic Converters, he left academia in 2024 to commercialize the modular architecture he had been researching. In March 2026 Scalvy closed a $13.9M Series A co-led by Silicon Badia with Azolla Ventures, Climate Capital and SkyRiver Ventures.
Zain Zaidi
Zain Zaidi is the co-founder and CEO of TransCrypts, a blockchain-powered credential and employment verification platform he started after struggling to access his own college transcript as an SJSU student. Backed by Mark Cuban, Pantera Capital, and Techstars, he has grown the company to 450+ enterprise clients and 4 million users across 9 countries, raised $18M+, launched JustScreen (the world's first free background check service), and earned a spot on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list in 2026 — all before turning 30. His platform has also helped over 4,000 Ukrainian refugees access medical records.