The Team
Here are the people who make MindValley unique: a tight team of the best minds from over 16 different countries (and counting).
If you like what you see, we invite you to join us , as we are hiring all year round to feed our growth.
Vishen Lakhiani Co-Founder
Vishen started his career with a BS in Computer and Electrical Engineering from the prestigious University of Michigan School of Engineering. He was recruited by Microsoft straight from university—but within 11 weeks realized that he was more captivated by running a software business than writing code. He turned entrepreneur at the age of 24 but his early ideas had the nasty habit of failing and leaving him broke. When he realized that his handicap was sales and marketing, he quit his business to take a commission only sales gig at LegalMatch, a then up-and-coming legal technology firm in San Francisco.
Despite zero experience, within 9 months he was running the company’s slick New York office. He left LegalMatch 2 years later to turn bedroom entrepreneur. Armed with an astute understanding of marketing and technology—his first idea, started in a small Manhattan apartment with just $500 of capital turned profitable in the first month and continued to grow and evolve.
MindValley was born from that bedroom business and life for Vishen has never been the same again.
Michael Reining Co-Founder
Before MindValley, Mike worked at eBay, the world’s largest eCommerce company, where he served as Head of New Venture Strategy and was one of the leading players that drove eBay’s expansion into the person-to-person classifieds and communications space.
His first accomplishment was driving eBay’s entry into the local classifieds space with a 25% investment in Craigslist, and the acquisitions of Rent.com, GumTree, Loquo, and Opusforum combined with the launch of Kijiji.com – eBay’s international network of nearly 50 classifieds websites, its biggest expansion since its 10 year old auction business. He was also the Co-Founder of iPlayMusic.com.
Mike received his MBA from Stanford and a BBA from the University of Michigan. Prior to Stanford, Mike was an Associate Consultant for the Boston Consulting Group.
Kristina Finance Director
Kristina Mand was one of our early co-founders and handled our legal, financial and accounting systems (all the boring stuff no one else likes to touch).
Kristina graduated as one of the top students in her country of Estonia and was awarded a medal by the President. She worked as vice-president for the non-profit, AIESEC, in both Estonia and Norway.
Before joining MindValley, she was a foreign and public relations advisor to Estonia’s top county governor. She holds a Masters in Political Science from the University of Edinburgh.
Kenneth Copywriter
In his previous life as copywriter for the largest multi-national ad agency network in the world, Kenneth has won a ton of awards in the field.
D&AD. Cannes Lions. London International—15 of them, to be exact. Over the past 2 years.
Deciding to take the plunge into the online entrepreneurial world of MindValley, he brings his proven award-winning expertise in Copywriting, Branding and Marketing to the table.
Kenneth wants to make YOU famous, just as he has made brands like Heineken, the Economist and Gillette famous as well.
Jiangti Chief Developer
Jiangti leads our programming team. He is a whiz-kid at web application development, and one of Malaysia’s top web 2.0 developers. In 2005, Jiangti developed BlinkList, which rapidly became one of the top Web 2.0 creations emerging from South East Asia and turned profitable in 2006.
He is also an avid rock climber and shuffles his time between Malaysia and Australia.
John Writer & Editor
John has a degree in Communication from the State University of New York and previously worked in the advertising world for BBDO, Publicis and EuroRSCG. At MindValley Media he works on producing content and traffic for our network of websites.
An established DJ and dance music producer, John also runs FoundationKL.org , a non-profit music promotions portal for up and coming DJs.
Nika Joint Ventures Manager
She brings with her a package of optimism, idealism, and 5 years of experience dealing with the international talent pool of AIESEC. Nika was a leader of her local AIESEC chapter and organized the largest educational conference in the world (1,000 participants from 95 countries).
She holds a Master’s in International Finance from the Nicolas Copernicus University in Torun, Poland and was accorded “The Dean’s Award for the Most Active Student”.
Living for experiences, she used to be a professional dancer, swimmer, life guard and a farmhand driving tractors. Besides working for MindValley, Nika is busy traveling and discovering the beauty of Asia through her SLR lens.
Katalina Project Manager
Hailing from Colombia and Canada, Katalina is responsible for managing two ecommerce properties that collectively do $1 million per year in sales. She manages a list of 200,000 subscribers, communicates with Joint Venture partners and handles email marketing.
Like most people at MindValley Media, she’s highly accomplished, having won writing competitions in Canada and a scholarship to the University of British Columbia.
Bilingual in Spanish and English, Katalina enjoys being immersed in new cultures and dancing!
Wu Han Chief Designer
As MindValley’s Media design and UI expert, Wu Han wears two very different hats—one as the structured, well-mannered programmer and other as the epicurean, conscientious designer.
His career path meanders through the kitchens of a top restaurant in Australia, a pre-publishing firm, a high profile dot-com, an e-learning company, and an interactive agency to name but a few places that have contributed to his experience. He holds tight to his principles and his Science degree from Curtin University of Technology.
Khalid Application Developer
Khalid is a self-professed “geek in denial” who uses coffee and copious amounts of Coca Cola to fuel Data Driven Web-Applications, SSL technologies, J2ME, PHP, and MySQL.
Hailing from the Middle East, Khalid spent his formative years in Malaysia, recently graduating from Multimedia University of Malaysia.
Khalid maintains his connection to the real world by playing basketball (and winning). He feeds his coffee addiction over the weekends in downtown Kuala Lumpur observing people.
Fatemeh Application Developer
Born in Iran, Fatemeh has been a citizen of Kuala Lumpur for the past few years.
She is the first female addition to the technical division of MindValley team, developing our PHP and Ruby eCommerce applications.
She holds a degree in Software Engineering and is on her way to a MBA from Multimedia University in Malaysia.
Paul Application Developer
Paul is from Russia. He loves PHP, Perl, Ruby On Rails, neuro-linguistic programming, hypnosis, and the warm climate of South-East Asia.
He spent several years traveling and working there, especially in Thailand.
He holds a Master’s in Computer Science from Marine Technical University in St. Petersburg, Russia.
Nicole Accounts & Office Manager
Nicole is gifted with the power to juggle a lot of things at once. She has the wisdom of Luca Pacioli taking care of MindValley’s accounts. She also assists with recruiting and makes sure that our office is ZEN.
Besides her unconditional love for numbers, she is a big fan of Michael Schumacher, roller blading and inspirational books.
Nicole is studying at the Association of Certified Chartered Accountants in Kuala Lumpur.
Justyna Project Manager
Justyna graduated with Honors from the University of Abertay in Scotland and earned her Master’s degree from Nicolaus Copernicus University in Poland.
She spent several years in sales and project management, working both in the corporate sector and with AIESEC in Poland.
She loves art to the extent that she calls it “her life” and runs a jewelry business based on her crafting skills.
Prior to living in Malaysia, Justyna had set up shop in Poland, Czech Republic, Scotland, and England.
Laura Writer
Born and bred in Zimbabwe, Laura settles in Malaysia at least temporarily after two years in Australia. The gifted writer and editor has received top awards including an Award of Excellence in English and Outstanding Academic Achievement. Diverse in youth and social issues, she has a impressive string of accolades under her belt.
This includes a position in the Association for Youth Development (AYD) Board of Governors, the appointment of Junior City Council Alderman for her outstanding contribution as Harare Junior City Councilor, certification in the Outward Bound Mountain School Zimbabwe and musical performances in Eisteddfod Music Festival playing the marimba. In social work, prior to her medical studies Laura has also translated for Spanish-speaking Cuban doctors at a Zimbabwean rural district hospital. In Malaysia she is involved with the Dyslexia Association. With such a diverse background, she brings to the table fresh insights and a keen and discerning mind.
Lisa Writer
Lisa is full of surprises. Part scientist, part social activist, part singer/songwriter and only slightly in part confused, the only constant in Lisa’s life is her love of writing.
She graduated from the University of Waikato in New Zealand with a B.Sc. (Tech) specializing in Genetics, and after much pining for good Malaysian cuisine, she left the land of cloning sheep to return to her home country. After journeying through social work and the entertainment magazine industry, she now joins MindValley to delve into the sea of words, which altogether comprise, for her at least, the infinite realms of Internet.
Katarina Project Manager
Katarina graduated from the University of Economics in Slovakia with a Masters in Marketing and Business. In AIESEC, she worked on various projects, her roles ranging from PR specialist to Team Leader, to establishing AIESEC’s new implementation project. She worked in DELL’s HR department for 2 years, and was responsible for various projects related to Recruitment, University relations, Job Fairs and Graduate programs. Following that, she worked in an advertising agency as an Account manager. She loves travel, sport, art, reading and interacting with honest, interesting and talented people.
CalvinJunior Programmer
Graduating from APIIT with a BSc (Hons) in computer, Calvin is the Jack-of-all-Trades in anything that is technical. A self confessed techno-gadget addict, Calvin can’t live without anything programmable for more than a week before he suffers withdrawal symptoms. With an undying love affair towards anything that blinks, bleeps and speaks sweet nothings to him from its 2GB heart, Calvin aspires to be the best inventor Malaysia has ever seen.
JuanProject Manager
Juan holds a degree in accountancy but his experience calculates to a lot more than the ordinary. Since the age of 15, he has worked in several industries from Steel and Oil&Gas companies to Telecommunications and IT Firms including IBM. Juan also gravitates towards NGOs, and is one of AIESEC’s enthusiastic contributors as well as an active JCI Member.
As if that’s not enough to cram into one’s credentials, Juan also had his own businesses teaching Super-Learning and NLP, exporting hardwood charcoal and trading tennis rackets. He aspires to be a world-class renown entrepreneur who can then help others in starting their own businesses.
AlexandraProject Manager
Joining our team all the way from Canada, Alexandra is our resident ‘go-to’ Google AdWords and pay-per-click expert and is also responsible for managing one of MindValley’s most profitable ecommerce properties.
She holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada, and recently graduated at the top of her class.
Although she misses regular snowboard trips to the Rocky Mountains, Alexandra spends her time in Asia indulging in her other passions of traveling, writing, learning new languages and photography.
AmirSEO and Social Media Specialist
Having been invited for conferences co-organized by Harvard University and attended international ones, Amir is a blogaholic and a passionate observer of the blogosphere. In fact, he’s currently busy writing a book on the subject in relation to spirituality and freedom of conscience.
His blog (featured in BBC and USA Today) has also been nominated and handpicked as a top 10 finalist out of thousands, twice in a row, for the world’s largest blog competition, The Weblog Awards.
On top of that, the public speaking champion and passionate music lover is obviously a full-time web junkie at MindValley where he’s our in-house expert on SEO and social media marketing.
Put simply, Amir is an upcoming writer, entrepreneur and music freak.
CarlosProject Manager
Born in Venezuela to Colombian parents, Carlos has worked with Skype where he strove to enhance user experience. He has been heavily involved in AIESEC and is interested in sociology and psychology. On top of that, he is also the co-founder of an IT company providing open source solutions to the public and private sectors in Venezuela.
When he’s not busy dancing Salsa, he’s responsible for managing some of MindValley’s most profitable ecommerce properties.
Ozzy PR Director
Ozzy was born in Kate’s Farm in Australia. His father is a midget Poodle named Rambo, his mom is a Labrador Retriever. This PR Whiz-kid is adept at charming the socks off our clients and the media.
Ozzy is the first “Labradoodle” in Malaysia, and the first dog in the country to hold a paid position in e-commerce. When he is not chewing on our laptop cables, Ozzy is in charge of PR.
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