Ela G's Blog

  Courts in Conflict: How Pickleball and Padel Is Challenging Tennis” A Closer Look at the Rise of Rival Racket Sports A decade ago, if you asked someone to name a racket sport, the answer was almost guaranteed: tennis. It carried the prestige of Wimbledon, the glamour of Serena and Federer, and the dominance of century-old country clubs. Today, however, tennis faces real competition. Pickleball and padel, two once obscure games, are increasingly converting tennis courts, stealing players, and forcing a rethinking of how we define racket sports. I have spent more than ten years playing tennis and have been recently interested in the business of sports. I believe that the story of pickleball and padel is a significant case study in accessibility, social design, and market timing. In this article, I’ll analyze how these sports rose, why they resonate, and what tennis must do if it hopes to remain the king of the court. Road Map Pickleball: How it became America’s fastest-growing spor...

Why I Chose American Like Me and  What I’m Hoping To Get Out Of It For this assignment, I chose American Like Me: Reflections on Life Between Cultures , by America Ferrera. The premise of looking at America through the lens of multiple cultures felt especially relevant to me as someone who thinks a lot about identity, belonging, and the opportunities that exist across borders. Oftentimes, I face dilemmas between focusing on my life and career here or returning home and contributing to my home country. The main reason stems from questioning if I really belong here. Thus, I’m hoping the book will give me both personal stories and broader insight into how different communities define what it means to be “American” and their own journeys throughout this process. My Impressions So Far So far, my impression is that the book offers a wide array of experiences that balance both the challenges and the opportunities of a multicultural life. Most stories touch on universal themes such as pare...

  I grew up in Turkey surrounded by healthcare. My grandfather, a surgeon still practicing in his eighties, showed me what lifelong dedication to patients and scientific progress looks like. My grandmother, a pharmacist, showed me that care is also about access and communication. These experiences pushed me toward the intersection of healthcare, innovation, and strategy. I became fascinated not only with how new therapies are developed but also with the business decisions that shape patient access. This summer, I worked as a Strategy Analyst at Kidod Science & Technologies, a med-tech startup based in Los Angeles. I had first partnered with the company through a consulting project at USC, and after the project ended, they asked me to continue independently. Kidod is a diagnostics company developing a revolutionary technology for early cancer detection through a simple, fast, and cost-effective test. The machine can identify cancer cells from a saliva or urine sample in less tha...

This summer, I worked as a Business and Strategy Analyst at Kidod Science & Technologies, a med-tech startup based in Los Angeles. Kidod develops a rapid cancer detection tool that can identify biomarkers from a saliva or urine sample in less than a minute. The company’s goal is to make cancer screening cheaper, faster, and more accessible to underserved populations. Because it was a small startup, my role changed almost every week. One day I was building investor slides, and the next, I was mapping out how to bring a medical device into the U.S. healthcare system. The best way to explain what I did is to break it into three areas: building the go-to-market strategy, supporting fundraising, and preparing for regulation. Go-to-Market Strategy I helped map out how Kidod could enter the U.S. market and obtain FDA approval. That meant researching which clinics and hospitals would adopt a new diagnostic first and how we could reach communities with little access to traditional cancer sc...