Meet the Founders

At Peergrade we are passionate about education, teaching and improving the learning experience. During the month of August, we will be sharing a series of blog posts introducing the team and story behind Peergrade.

What’s it like founding a start-up? Find out as our founders discuss the motivation and challenges involved in founding a start up.

David Kofoed Wind · Co-founder and Head of Business

David is a PhD-student at the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) with a focus on machine learning and data science. He has previously worked as a software developer at CERN in Switzerland. David has also been working as an external consultant for Mærsk Line doing predictive modelling on large data sets. He is the co-author of 7 scientific publications and has been a lecturing 3 university courses, and been a teaching assistant in 12.

What has been the hardest part of co-founding a startup?

Transcending from the introverted world of a PhD in mathematics to the extroverted world of managing people and running a business which includes negotiating and other fluffy stuff.

What has been the most rewarding?

Seeing the entire team having a great time together on a day to day basis and continuously watching the product develop while I am focusing on other things.

What is currently inspiring your work?

I have taken a lot of inspiration from the books: Rework, The Lean Startup and Zero To One. I spend a lot of my time talking to other startup founders, and there is no limit to how much I can learn from them.

What’s one thing many people don’t know about you?

I used to be 100% into skateboarding and at my peak I could do 360-flips and crooked grinds.

Simon Lind · Co-founder and Head of Product Design

Simon has several years of experience within digital design, both as a freelance designer and as a designer in a digital product development team. With a strong practical skill-set within interaction design and front-end development in combination with his knowledge obtained through his academic studies of design, he is in charge of making sure we build the best possible user experience.

What has been the hardest part of co-founding a startup?

Everything! I’ve never tried starting a company before so I’m totally green when it comes to building a startup. Building a business model, collaboration with developers, growing a team etc.

What has been the most rewarding?

Being pushed out of your comfort zone like I have, has resulted in a lot of learning — both in terms of learning the business side of building a digital product and in terms of learning to manage a team.

What is currently inspiring your work?

There’s a lot of different people and products that I admire, but one that always stands out is Frank Chimero. He’s a designer writing a lot of good stuff about design work. I especially like his book The Shape of Design.

What’s one thing not many people know about you?

I have the black belt in Taekwondo and I’ve been rollerblading for the last 12 years of my life!

Malthe Jørgensen · Co-founder and Head of Technology

Malthe has more than 10 years of experience with software development working on everything from GPU-optimizations of physics simulations to building full web solutions for large corporations. With previous experience as startup CTO and as university teacher he is the perfect person to lead development of Peergrade.

What has been the hardest part of co-founding a startup?

The startup schedule is seemingly offset from the rest of the world’s. As a founder you’re ultimately responsible, and that can mean staying up late to have a call across time zones, or skip dinner to do damage control when something unexpected happens. Managing, and adapting to the friction this creates, is one of the things that has taken the longest time for me to learn.

What has been the most rewarding?

Getting to build my own product has always been a dream of mine, and the fact that we get to choose what to build, and how, is hugely rewarding to me.

Another rewarding experience, has been seeing our employees grow and succeed — something I haven’t been in a position to experience before.

What is currently inspiring your work?

People who are endlessly inquisitive, jovial, and aspire to always educate themselves. Here I’m thinking of people like Tim Urban (waitbutwhy.com) and Randall Munroe (What if? and xkcd.com) whose curiosity inspires me to learn, think, and know more.

What’s one thing not many people know about you?

I love chilis and once got dared into eating a whole bowl of them in one sitting. I think it was about 16 or 18 chilis — seeing past a bit of sniffling and hiccups — I still found it an enjoyable experience.

Check back next Friday to meet the tech team.