On 21 September 2019 founder Kunal Sood conceptualized and launched #WeThePlanet as a high-level in-person convening at the United Nations during the 74th UNGA with the President of the UN General Assembly María Fernanda Espinosa Garcés and H.E. Thomas Remengesau Jr., President of Palau to transform our world for a better future. #WeThePlanet is on a mission to make the impossible possible by uniting the youth and the elders, the left and the right to positively impact a billion lives over the next decade. Sood and co-founder Laura Muranaka are actively creating a virtual platform and real life #WeThePlanet Campus to safeguard and protect all life on land and under the sea.
“We as humans must go above and beyond just serving ‘We the People’ by focusing on serving something that is larger than ourselves. As a force for good, we must come together without fear or favor and become #WeThePlanet,” Sood explains.
There is a connection between the current pandemic and the lost harmony between humanity and nature. Integral ecology architecture is one way to demonstrate how human systems can reorient to address human and planetary longevity, social inequities, and increase health and wellness to flourish into the future. COVID-19 highlighted the challenges faced in both the in-person summit industry and the urban architectural industry surrounding the future of working environments. #WeThePlanet attempts to investigate new and forward-looking opportunities for people-friendly architecture in harmony with nature. The #WeThePlanet Campus serves as a communicative media platform to protect all life on land and under the sea while advancing the frontiers of design. The floating building campus is aimed at serving as an inspiring example for future life, living and working environments, and will be addressing topics such as longevity, climate change, social justice and equal opportunities. The 50/50 concept foresees architecture for the future centered on shared spaces that increase wildlife habitat in urban environments.
#WeThePlanet is a culmination of over two decades worth of experience that led Sood from India to New York working alongside extraordinary style icons in the fashion world, and working in global health and integrative medicine, alongside world-renowned physician Dr. TJ Cherian in Chennai, India. In 2006, tragically Sood lost his mentor to suicide. This tremendous loss served as a catalyst for founding #WeThePlanet and creating eight virtual #WeThePlanet global summits during the pandemic in 2020 that highlighted the voices of change-makers such as Kajol, Deepak Chopra, Sidharth Malhotra, Shekar Kapur, Aloe Blacc, Susan Rockefeller, Jane Seymour and extraordinary youth. India is a model nation with the power of youth to galvanize #WeTheFuture as a week in the world focused on empowering next generation leaders. Furthermore, #WeThePlanet successfully launched #WeHaveADream on Gandhi Jayanti as a movement to end all forms of social, racial and environmental injustice inspired by the legacy of Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. Most recently at Princeton University, Sood recently keynoted and co-hosted the Art of Social and Racial Injustice virtual symposium to reinforce Gandhi and MLK’s lessons of exponential leadership to unite the east and the west.
Growing up in India, Sood suffered as a young child from a learning disability and obesity and was known as the Rasna Kid in the infamous television ad where he drank the entire jug of Rasna, and then said, “I love you Rasna.” Given this stereotype he was often the target of bullying in school and identified as a misfit and outlier. Early in life this suffering taught him valuable lessons where he transformed to build the moral courage, emotional resilience and mental strength to stand up to his adversaries. Sood learned how to harness his learning disability as a superpower and made it his life’s calling to serve as a guardian and protector of the people and the planet.
After curating TEDx at the United Nations and launching the first-ever Novus Summit at the United Nations General Assembly Hall in 2016, Sood became a TED Resident, Tribeca Disruptor Honoree, Stanford CCARE Fellow and Innovation Fellow at Columbia University. Sood’s role in the company is to set the overall vision and culture of #WeThePlanet and develop and execute global strategies to make the impossible possible. He recently launched We The Future (WTF) on Clubhouse a new social app and as already gained over 25,000 members and followers.
Today Kunal Sood is a world renowned impact entrepreneur and award-winning disruptive innovator. From serving in the slums of Mumbai as a global health scientist with Harvard at PUKAR to building Global Movements at the United Nations General Assembly he is focused on unlocking humanity's exponential potential to usher in a new era of human prosperity and planetary flourishing. Forbes named him an Impact Icon and spotlighted as a Global Movement Builder given his passion for building the network of networks. He has a life-long love for learning having earned five master’s degrees that include an MBA from Kellogg at Northwestern University, MA from CIIS, MSc from UCSF, MAPP/MPhil from University of Pennsylvania and is currently an Innovation Fellow at Columbia Business School.
The next decade has been hailed by the United Nations as the decade of action. Given the democratization of information, ideas and technology, it has caused a kind of perfect storm for humanity to come together and make the impossible possible. #WeThePlanet recognizes that amidst this global change, there is a new force of young entrepreneurs working to create social impact-driven business models and strategic frameworks by focusing on consumer consciousness as opposed to just profit-driven conventional businesses. As high impact purpose-driven entrepreneurs and exponential leaders solving the most pressing social and environmental challenges, Sood is focusing their efforts in the company on leadership, strategy and impact to protect the biodiversity of the planet while creating a world of abundance.
Impact Entrepreneur Kunal Sood is transforming the world by impacting a billion lives
