Ben Slavin Email & Phone Number

Washington, Dc, Us

Software, technology and product consulting. Proving ground for new ideas and new technologies.I help mid-market and growth-stage companies make smart technology choices, focusing on tech that empowers their teams and customers to achieve results.My work spans custom software development, improvements to existing systems, and AI/data solutions that enhance team capabilities. I guide business leaders in making informed tech decisions that address immediate needs and support long-term goals. Often, I work as part of the team executing on that strategy as well.

Baltimore, Maryland, Us

As part of Mindgrub's senior leadership team, reporting to the COO, I led Mindgrub's Agency and Consulting practices. With more than 120 engineers, designers, marketers, strategists and project managers, these were Mindgrub's largest business units, generating about $25 million in annual revenue.I led the team to find and deliver their best work through empowerment and active engagement. I worked with clients to craft solutions and solve problems. I maintained a role as an Engagement Director for NASA, Booz Allen Hamilton, the USO, the Livestrong Foundation, Coppin State University, CreditXpert and others.

Baltimore, Maryland, Us

Member of the Global Organizing Team for the world's largest hackathon, defining and implementing strategy for Space Apps, as it grew 725% to 58,000 global participants in 152 countries and territories. Directly responsible for architecting and building the technology platform used by citizen scientists as they tackle challenges facing human space flight, technology in space, robotics, Earth science and even COVID-19.

Baltimore, Md, Us

Bootstrapped Chalk + Chisel to $1 million annual revenue. Led engineering, sales, operations and design. Served as executive creative director, lead strategist, and/or full-stack developer on all agency projects.Led expansion into virtual reality (Discovery VR, Autoblog 360, USA Today VR Stories), augmented reality (Newseum Pulitzer Prize Gallery AR experience, The Good Fight AR book), and experiential activations (including with Nike and NASA).Brought together a cross-disciplinary team, including three co-founders, and enabled the team to explore ideas and create new experiences. Encouraged creativity and the love of craft; and worked to empower people to do their best work.Supported the company's emphasis on product development and on iterative creative process to understand individual perspectives and design new solutions. Fostered the things that drove the team and worked to cultivate an environment where everyone had room to experiment.Chalk + Chisel joined Mindgrub in 2017.

As founder and CTO of Heliograph, I built a globally distributed web-based caching and content distribution system from the ground up.I served as chief architect of the company’s core technology, written primarily in Erlang. The Heliograph platform was designed to meet microsecond benchmarks, achieving core priorities of enabling maximum performance for clients. It spanned hundreds of servers in the Americas, Europe and Asia and performed on-the-fly optimization of content (minification, lossless compression and route optimization).

Washington, Dc, Us

Built and lead a technical team focused on rapid solutions to complex technical problems. Recruited and trained an in-house development team, building the agency's technical capabilities from a focus on building static sites, brochureware and blogs to a focus on interactive sites and physical installations driven by real-time data.Worked alongside COO, Leslie Bradshaw, to develop business and sales strategies and a focus on operational efficiency. This work was, in part, responsible for JESS3's inclusion on the INC 500 list (the agency saw a sales growth between 2008 and 2011 of almost 900 percent).Lead technical and implementation strategy for clients including (among others) American Express, AT&T, Foursquare, Intel, MTV, National Geographic, Nike, Samsung, TBS and Twitter.

As a founding partner of Wavecrazy, I planned and deployed physical infrastructure for a wireless data network designed to provide broadband connectivity to uncontested and unserved markets in Central Pennsylvania.Architected, deployed, and maintained Internet Service Provider (ISP) backend infrastructure to support Wavecrazy's operations. Oversaw network infrastructure, backbone connectivity and hosting services.

Led execution of the revitalization of the company’s core offering -- the geniusrocket.com web application. Reported directly to both the CEO and COO, and worked with the entire executive team to develop and pursue the strategic vision. The results enabled the firm to serve over 12,000 creative artists across 170 countries, a more than 500% increase in market penetration.Transformed a problematic platform into a robust system capable of increased capacity and allowing future scalability. Led the domestic and international teams that were responsible for the development efforts.Simplified a complex software development process, reducing time from identification of business need to technical solution from months to weeks or days and increasing alignment with the strategic direction of the business.Worked closely with sales, marketing and operations to inform and assist strategy decisions and provide execution assistance.

Drove the development of WonBid’s core technology -- an online auction platform based on academic research into optimizing the auction experience.Engineered the multi-tiered application, utilizing a distributed architecture to enable scalability required by the business model. Led the team that implemented this solution. Developed the API that was offered to consumers and partners.Established best practices for development enabling efficient interaction among a distributed team.Worked with the CEO to develop overall business strategy. Actively participated in formation of growth and deployment strategies, and authored the WonBid business plan, resulting in "angel" funding.Planned and executed highly successful test marketing efforts that proved the underlying business concept and provided market research that was fed into the development process.I maintained a board seat and an advisory role, until 2008.

Pittsburgh, Pa, Us

Joined a team of faculty and post-doctoral researchers to create a model for failure of polymeric surface coatings.Developed a simulation engine based on our failure model, using advanced techniques for speed, efficiency and accuracy.Authored "Mechanical Modeling of Failure in Surface Coatings". Published and presented at SPIE International Symposium on Smart Structures & Materials/NDE.

E-commerce platform designed to provide customizable "X of the month" subscriptions (e.g. "Cookie of the month" offered in partnership with Mrs. Fields). Think "Goldbelly meets Amazon's Subcribe and Save" a decade too soon.GiftAlchemy offered businesses a recurring revenue model with predictable batched ordering, and offered customers variety and flexibility in their subscriptions.I was responsible for creating the technical requirements, developing a proof of concept in PHP, and leading a contracted development team that build a proof of concept in ASP.net

Mba, Strategy, Technology And Entrepreneurship

Bse, Computer Engineering