MindStand originally began as a hackathon idea at UMD’s “Bitcamp” competition in May 2018. Technical founders Eric Solender and Nikita Wootten submitted a “hate speech identifier” as an entry, placing second in the Bloomberg Award for Most Philanthropic Hack. CEO and cofounder, Michael Ogunsanya, joined shortly thereafter to provide his vision and corporate experience in order to scale MindStand Technologies.
With industry acclaim and an eagerness to innovate, MindStand began technical development in July 2018, scrapping our original hackathon code. Since then, we’ve partnered with over 13 HR firms to improve inclusion, joined the board of numerous DEI-focused nonprofits, and executed our company vision to become the gold standard in combating online harassment. From holding initial board meetings at UMBC’s dining hall to joining the Inaugural Techstars Equitech cohort, MindStand has created a family that’s dedicated to our vision.
Michael leads MindStand’s vision by ensuring that our philanthropic mission and business strategies are shared with organizations around the world.
Eric leads technical development at MindStand, in addition to head of programming on the backend. His main area of focus is backend data processing and storage, but also take hands on ML and User Interface Development.
Nikita leads the ML development at MindStand. Although his main area of focus is on machine learning and analysis, he also works on the backend and User Interface.
Anthony leads partnerships between MindStand and mission-aligned organizations building DEI services
Taylor develops and maintains MindStand's branding system. She leads design for document layouts, icons, marketing material, and UI displays.
Chintan leads the UI and UX processes for the creation of MindStand AI products. He engages externally with clients and partners.
Micah leads the design and curation of content for all of MindStand's social media platforms.
Mark is responsible for the development of MindStand AI’s machine learning insights and product.
Kiesha has an extensive background of nearly 15 years of executive leadership support. She works in the capacity of C-Suite management and administration and establishing onboarding systems.
Steve develops MindStand’s machine learning insights and implements frontend features into the dashboard.
Sam is part of MindStand's backend team where he works on data pipeline development in addition to deployments and maintenance.
Tara is a graduating master’s candidate in Data Science at UMBC. She is responsible for developing sales and investor pipelines by working collaboratively with internal and external stakeholders at MindStand.
Antonio is a graduating senior in Chemical Engineering at UMBC who contributes to MindStand's machine learning infrastructure.
Rylan is a GW organization psychology student. She researches and develops MindStand customer personas for internal and external use.
Ranye migrates users from Office 365 to Gsuite, as well as IT infrastructure and security management.
Francine is part of Women’s Leadership and is a Career Advancement Expert.
Genevieve is an exited entrepreneur and the Head of Applied Research at VSCO.
Tim is the director of CoRaL lab at UMBC and the Chief Data Scientist at Synaptiq.
Fostering healthy online communications,
one post at a time.