About Us
We are a startup in making!
Smart Paper is developed a team of learning scientists and technologists currently working at Playpower Labs. Smart Paper will become the first product of LearnSense - an upcoming AI in Education startup.
Paper is an integral part of our education system, and it is completely disconnected from the world of digital learning. This is why we have designed Smart Paper technology. We want to give students and teachers freedom to work on both paper and digital. We believe that paper learning has many benefits, and we need to connect paper with digital for a better future of learning.
Our Story
Powering the future of learning
Many years ago, we started building futuristic education technologies. Our work began by building the EdTech company Playpower Labs, where we did a series of innovations that touched the lives of millions of students. We are extending our legacy by creating the
Smart Paper technology so that the future of education is more integrated.
Meet The Team
Founders
nirmal patel
Co-Founder, CEO
Nirmal is a multi-award-winning edtech researcher and a computing child prodigy. He has close to fifteen years of hands-on work experience spanning across programming, data science, AI, and learning science. Nirmal loves innovating new technologies that can solve challenging problems. Nirmal became one of the youngest Linux engineers in India at the age of 15. His educational data science research has won multiple awards. Nirmal actively works with India's Ministry of Education, where he uses data to address fairness and equity issues in national tests. Nirmal has also authored award-winning and grant-winning educational games that have been a subject of rigorous learning science research.
derek Lomas
Co-Founder
Derek is a reputed cognitive scientist and designer. He received his postdoctoral training at University of California’s the UC San Diego Design Lab with Donald Norman. He has a bachelor's degree in Cognitive Science (Yale, '03), a master's degree in Visual Art (UCSD, 2009) and a doctorate in Human-Computer Interaction (Carnegie Mellon, 2014). He won a Poptech Social Innovation fellowship, a MacArthur Foundation "Digital Media and Learning" award, a Sesame Workshop & White House "Impact" Award and is an alumni of Techstars. He runs Playpowerlabs.com, which provides education companies with design, data-science and software development services.
Advisors
David GODDY
Advisor
David Goddy is a former senior ed tech executive at Scholastic and consultant to research- and data-based, content-driven ed tech companies and startups. At Scholastic, he led significant turnarounds in three education divisions providing supplemental instructional products, both print and digital, with a particular focus on intervention, reading and supporting the needs of underserved and marginalized students and their teachers.
Technologists
Darshan PATEL
Full-Stack Engineer
Darshan is a hacker at heart, and loves building complex technical systems.
Mithilesh Thakkar
Machine Learning Engineer
Mithilesh is a computer geek who loves creating AI to support classrooms.
