Internship Spotlight: Nico Sahi ’26, Illumination Entertainment
Nico Sahi ’26 drew on the MBA core curriculum during a marketing internship at a leading Hollywood animation studio.
We asked rising second-year MBA students to check in from their summer internships, where they applied the lessons of their first year at Yale SOM.
Internship: Illumination Entertainment, Santa Monica, California
Hometown: Albuquerque, New Mexico
Pronouns: he/him/his
The SOM class you’re using on the job: Generative AI for Social Media
Go-to work lunch: Lunch is catered every day!
After-work routine: Vibing with the windows down in LA traffic
Favorite thing about internship city: All the fresh fruit
For my summer internship, I’m working in marketing strategy at Illumination Entertainment, a premiere animation company behind such recognizable hits as The Super Mario Bros. Movie; the Sing franchise; and a personal favorite, Minions! The role involves strategic research across a range of marketing tactics to support upcoming film releases for the company’s summer 2026 slate.
I studied film and TV production at NYU Tisch as an undergraduate, so I already understood how to create Hollywood magic, but the MBA at SOM has allowed me to bring a new level of analytical rigor, financial accounting, and product development skills to this internship. I took several classes at the intersection of creativity and technology, such as Tauhid Zaman’s course Generative AI for Social Media, where I learned how to automate social media platforms as levers for influence and persuasion and to use AI tools to analyze campaign performance.
Core courses like Accounting, Modeling Managerial Decisions, and Workforce have also been helpful in navigating this new role. For instance, in Workforce, we talked a lot about how to design processes that support specific outputs. That background has allowed me to appreciate the way a company like Illumination, which requires incredible creative output, has organized itself to have an open and collaborative environment where new ideas can be tested out and iterated on.
The Yale SOM community has been central to my experience in Los Angeles. I organized an MBA meet-up for media and entertainment interns across different business school programs and over 100 people showed up, including four of my fellow SOM classmates interning in the city. I am also looking forward to an upcoming SOM summer social hosted by the Los Angeles alumni chapter, where I will get to meet with SOM graduates and continue building my network.
This internship has helped to reinforce my commitment to the idea that the boldest storytelling happens at the intersection of new technology and creativity, and has helped me clarify what contributions I can make to facilitate the next era of tech adoption in this exciting field. Additionally, as an incoming co-president of the Media, Entertainment and Sports Association (MESA), I am eager to share my learnings with the incoming class at SOM!
Nico Sahi is a recipient of the Yale SOM Alumni Fund Dean’s Society Scholarship (2024–2025).
