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Boryana Dineva Straubel (May 25, 1983 – June 19, 2021) was a Bulgarian businesswoman and philanthropist who emigrated to the United States. She managed a family foundation that focused on environmental sustainability. She founded a jewelry company, Generation Collection, to promote environmental sustainability through the recycling of metals. She was a manager in Human Resources at Tesla, the electric car company. She married Tesla executive J. B. Straubel in 2013. In 2015, she became the vice president of Human Resources for the Wikimedia Foundation for one year. As she was bicycling in a designated lane in Nevada in June 2021, a car crossed the center line and struck her, killing her instantly.

Early years
Boryana Straubel (Boryana Dineva) was born in Mezdra, Bulgaria. She was raised by a single mother. From a very young age the value of hard work was instilled in Boryana. Developing a penchant for hard work, Boryana graduated highschool as class valedictorian in 2000.

After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 her family migrated to Germany where they lived in a refugee camp for a few months. Afterwards she lived in Austria and Russia.

Boryana Straubel was passionate about maths. She was extremely shy and preferred surfing the internet at a cybercafe than going out with friends. On 2005 she moved to the United States.

Education
Boryana Straubel studied at the Silicon Valley College of San Mateo and graduated on 2008. She got scholarships from San Mateo Rotary Club and studied at the University of California, Berkeley where she got a B.S. in Economics.

In 2019 and 2020 she went back to school and obtained a Management Science & Engineering Master's degree and an MBA at Stanford University.

Boryana was bilingual in Bulgarian and English and had professional proficency in German. She had basic knowledge in Russian and Spanish.

She was 2018 keynote speaker for College of San Mateo.

Career
After getting her B.S. in Economics from Berkeley she worked as account manager for the software company Brocade. Afterwards Boryana Straubel worked for a little startup called Tesla.

From 2011 to 2015 Boryana worked at Human Resources, Operations and Data Analysis at Tesla. During those four years and a half the employee count went from 600 to 13 000 due to an exponential growth of the company.

Boryana Straubel led the Human Resources Analytics, Information Systems, and Operation groups. At Tesla, Boryana worked in close partnership with staff and management to design and develop programs to advance strategy and achieve organizational goals. She was instrumental in building the company’s people analytics capacity and developing a data-driven organizational design to support growth. She was instrumental in creating the Tesla culture that she summed up to:

"'1. Competitive to be the best in all we do.

2. No fear of solving hard problems ourselves.

3. Be entrepenurial, resourceful.

4. Minimize bureaucracy, just get it done.

5. Efficient and sustainable (demonstrate our mission).

6. Work hard, love what we do, have fun!'"

- Boryana Straubel

From 2015 to 2016 Boryana Straubel was VP of Human Resources for the Wikimedia Foundation. As Vice President of Human Resources, Boryana oversaw the Wikimedia Foundation’s talent and culture function, including talent acquisition, organizational training and development, and talent management and people analytics. She designed and drive initiatives around workplace culture and well-being, including diversity, respect, and implemented new processes and tools to support Foundation staff and stewardship. Boryana reported to Wikimedia Foundation Chief Operating Officer Terence Gilbey.

"Culture is the sum of the actions of each individual. Each employee can be a partner in creating a fulfilling and inspiring work environment. I’m thrilled to be joining the Wikimedia Foundation for the opportunity to advance an organizational culture rooted in the Wikimedia values of transparency, stewardship, and openness."

- Boryana Straubel

From March 2016 to July 2017 Boryana was Program Director at Tesla. She left Tesla to study at Stanford University where she got a M.S. in Management Sloan (2019)) and M.S. in Management Science and Engineering (2020) by the Stanford’s School of Engineering.

Straubel Foundation
The Straubel Foundation's goal is to help accelerate the transition to a more environmentally sustainable future.

From 2015 JB Straubel is the President of the Straubel Foundation. Boryana Straubel was Executive Director until his death on 2021. Straubel Foundation applies principles in the sustainability field, focused on: recognition of leadership, impact investments, and education.

The Straubel Foundation’s annual Leadership Awards recognize the best in achievement and leadership potential. They are also one of the ways in which the Foundation supports young leaders and scholars as they develop sustainable solutions to environmental and societal challenges.

In 2019 The Straubel Foundation gave one of its leadership awards to Greta Thunberg.

"'Boryana wanted to help people who had leadership potential and were committed to make a difference in the world, but who needed a little extra support to get there ... She was full of energy — passionate, caring and very persistent.'"

- Pamela Hinds, professor at Stanford School of Engineering.

Generation Collection
Generation Collection craft their pieces from recycled gold, platinum, and silver from end of life jewelry and electronics. Upcycling metals creates a higher-value, investment-grade product. This sourcing method generates significant energy, water, and CO2 emissions savings. 1 gram of mined gold uses 67kWh of energy while 1 gram of recycled gold uses 2kWh of energy. Recycled platinum is even more impactful as platinum production is 3 times more energy intensive than gold. 1 gram of mined platinum uses ~167kWh of energy while 1 gram of recycled platinum uses 3kWh of energy.

Most US jewelry is crafted from 14K (58% gold), 18K (75% gold), or 22K (92% gold) that loses most of its value the moment it is purchased. For example, rose gold is made from a combination of gold, silver, and copper. The most valuable rose gold pieces are 22K, which is only 92% of gold. When resold, this jewelry is only worth a fraction of its purchase price because the consumers were paying for the brand value and marketing instead of the intrinsic value of the jewelry. Low karat jewelry is a very profitable business. In contrast, Generation Collection is crafted from solid 24 karat (99.999%) gold. Overtime, the value of their pieces will correlate with the market price of gold.

Personal life
On August 3, 2013, Boryana got married with JB Straubel and lived in Woodside, California.

In 2015 Boryana gave birth to twins.

When JB Straubel left as CTO at Tesla in July 2019, they moved to Nevada where Redwood Materials was located. JB Straubel was his founder and CEO.

Boryana was a enthusiast cyclist. In 2020 she had 116 days of activity with 144 hours of cycling, making 2605 km an 23 884 elevation.

During the 2020 confinement for COVID-19 Boryana and her husband JB wrote a 150-page book with about 400 years of family history. It was titled «The Straubel Family. Together is Better» and printed 3 books for their twins and JB's dad. "Our kids are only 6 years old but we hope this will be helpful for them as they grow. The lessons we wrote are down to earth and as real as it gets. JBs dad always says “Together is better.”, so we made that one of the take-always. The book highlights the importance of family as one of the ingredients to a full life. JBs dad always talks about that so this book was our way to show him how much we appreciate him."

- Boryana Straubel

Death


Boryana Straube died after being hit by a car on US-395A at 7:45 AM of Saturday June 19, 2021. The crash happened on US-395 Alternate and Washoe County mile marker 1. A silver 2015 Ford Edge was heading south on US-395A when it crossed the double yellow line and went into the southbound lanes hitting 38-year-old Boryana Straubel, who was in the designated bike lane.