About UsTeam
Sandra Oh Lin
Founder
Sandra is the mommy of a 4.5 year old girl who loves to draw - hearts are a specialty - and a 2.5 year old boy who enjoys cutting with scissors...maybe a little too much.
Sandra has worked in tech and consumer products throughout her career. Sandra began her career in product development at Procter & Gamble. After working in product management at a couple of Silicon Valley start-ups, Sandra joined PayPal. At PayPal, she launched PayPal Mobile and led product marketing for the PayPal Merchant Services business. Most recently, Sandra was the GM for eBay Fashion. Sandra left eBay to start Kiwi Crate, which was born from a passion for hands-on play and learning for kids and an implicit understanding that parents are seeking quality choices and convenience in their busy lives. Sandra earned a BS in Chemical Engineering from Case Western Reserve University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Yael Pasternak Valek
Co-Founder
Yael is mom to a very curious boy who is quite the little scientist - intent on figuring out how everything works. He also loves painting with any medium - whether it be with a paintbrush, a spray bottle, or with fingers.
As a busy mom, Yael was drawn to Kiwi Crate's convenience. She's also the driver behind keeping our projects super simple and kid-driven. Yael has years of experience in mom-focused companies. She was a founding member of Maya's Mom, a social network for moms which was acquired by BabyCenter. At BabyCenter, Yael managed the Community of millions of moms. Prior to her work in the mom space, Yael drove products in the Search & Media group at Yahoo! and at Vividence. She began her career as a software engineer. Yael holds a BS and MS in Computer Science from Stanford University.
Yu Pan
Co-Founder
Yu Pan is a new daddy to a little girl who is already great at expressing herself, especially when tired and hungry.
Yu Pan has spent his career building cool products and businesses - ranging from payments and robots to video and SEO. Yu Pan was drawn to the fact that Kiwi Crate makes “real products (both offline and online) that make a difference.” As one of the first engineers at YouTube, he was most recently at Google. Previously, he was on the founding team at RoboteX, at startup building affordable, high quality safety robots, and the CTO of Adzaar, a marketplace for page rank optimization. Yu Pan was a co-founder of PayPal. Yu Pan has a B.S. in Computer Science from the University of Illinois.
Michael Kassoff
Engineering
Michael is the father of a little boy who investigates everything - from being the first in the family to figure out how to dim the lights in the dining room to discovering what is on top of the 4 story cat condo.
Mike is an entrepreneur who loves creating products that people rave about. After hearing about Kiwi Crate, he reached out to learn more, passionate about the mission to encourage quality hands-on play and learning for kids. Most recently, Mike founded Dragosaurus, an iOS app shop. Previously he cofounded Second Floor Systems, a product data store, and helped create gumshoe.com, a childrens' shoe retailer. Michael has a BA in Computer Science from Cornell University and a MS and PhD in Computer Science from Stanford University.
Elaine Kim
Marketing
As the older cousin and go-to babysitter, Elaine spends many hours with her amazing 3 year old cousins. They've introduced her to all things transportation, the joy of band-aids, and a multitude of projects built out of pipecleaners.
With a background in marketing promotions and finance, Elaine manages our marketing programs as well as analytics. Elaine has also single-handedly spearheaded sourcing and operations and outfitted our new office. Prior to Kiwi Crate, Elaine was the General Manager and Marketing and Promotions Director at WBRU. Having also spent time in investment banking at JP Morgan, Elaine never tires. In her "off" time from working at a start-up, Elaine is constantly on the go - traveling, cycling, and eating. Elaine has a degree in Biomedical Engineering from Brown University.