Montauk Capital names NYU Stern professor Chandan as venture partner

Manhattan, NY Montauk Capital, a venture studio and fund building the Electron Economy, appointed Dr. Sam Chandan as venture partner. In this advisory role, Dr. Chandan will support the firm’s expansion into the built environment, bringing deep expertise in real estate capital markets and the application of artificial intelligence to the real estate sector. 

Montauk Capital is positioning for what it views as the largest asset class expansion in the history of the built world: Infra Tech. AI, electrification, and increasing power demand are fundamentally rewriting the economics of real estate. Through recent portfolio investments like Perimeter Compute—which activates stranded electrical capacity in existing buildings as AI inference nodes — Montauk is leading the shift turning real estate into critical energy infrastructure. The firm believes this shift will create a new category of infrastructure investment across the built environment, representing a market opportunity projected to grow from $14 trillion today to $27 trillion by 2035. 

Dr. Chandan brings a background spanning global finance, industry research, and academia. He is the founding director of the Chao-Hon Chen Institute for Global Real Estate Finance at the NYU Stern School of Business, where his research focuses on structural innovation within property markets and the practical application of artificial intelligence to commercial real estate. 

Additionally, he is the founder and executive chairman of Chandan Economics, a data and analytics firm serving institutional property markets. 

“The convergence of energy infrastructure and the built environment represents one of the most significant and underappreciated opportunities in real estate today,” said Dr. Chandan. “Montauk has developed a clear and differentiated thesis on where this market is headed, and I look forward to working with the team to build the companies that will define this emerging category.” “Commercial real estate is becoming one of the most important deployment channels for infrastructure innovation,” said Philip Krim, co-founder of Montauk Capital. “The owners of these assets are increasingly asking how they can create new revenue streams, support growing power demand, and future-proof their portfolios. Sam has spent his career helping institutional real estate investors understand structural change, making him uniquely positioned to help shape this next chapter.”