How French-Lebanese entrepreneur Rand Hindi made it onto MIT's 35 Under 35

When Rand Hindi was included in this year’s MIT 35 Innovators Under 35 list, no one was surprised. This Lebanese, who moved to France when he was just a kid, started his first business at age 14, and started his PhD at 21, has won over Paris.

Following his nomination, we decided it was high time we share his unusual journey with our readers, and catch up on the pivot his big data startup Snips is going through. The entrepreneur invited me to join his team for a hackathon at his apartment, to finish up the prototype of their new product for the MIT 35 Innovators Under 35 awards ceremony on September 22. “We don’t do [our hackathons] at work, because we want to get out of that work mindset,” explains the CEO.

A quick look at the team having lunch is enough to be convinced that team spirit and quality of life are, indeed, a priority to the startup. The ten scientists that make up the team live and breathe Snips; Rand even wears Snips sneakers. They are Adidas, with orange strips – the color of the company – with the logo embroidered.

Weight gain, and startup launch

To understand Snips, and Hindi, you have to rewind back to 2008. Hindi, a bio-technologies student interested in data and quantified self, decided to look for a solution to quit smoking without gaining weight. As he started paying attention to diets, he came to the conclusion that “diets are bullshit.” None of the thousands of existing diets work for everyone, so every person should have a particular diet that works for them. That’s when he decided to develop an algorithm that would enable anyone to find their own specialized diet by simply using data from their daily life.

Original article by Aline Mayard

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How French-Lebanese entrepreneur Rand Hindi made it onto MIT’s 35 Under 35