Meet the Team
At Initium, we think our team captures the essence of “small but mighty”. Our team of seven people — two cofounders, an advisor, an engineer, and three interns — has worked tirelessly to bring Initium’s platform to life, democratizing grant writing for all. Within our small cohort, we’re able to support each other and explore any curiosities or ideas we have to improve Initium. From founder to intern, we’re a group of creative thinkers, nimble problem solvers, and enthusiastic coworkers. Read on to learn a little more about everyone here at Initium!
Rada Mihalcea
Our founder Rada Mihalcea is the Janice M. Jenkins Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Michigan and the Director of the Michigan Artificial Intelligence Lab. Holding a PhD from Oxford and SMU, Rada is an expert in LLMs, multilingual natural language processing, and computational social sciences. She started Initium with the hope of empowering more people to bring their ideas to life. “While many people have amazing ideas, the ability to pursue them is often limited to those who already have resources, which is ironic. This in turn limits the scope and breadth of the challenges being addressed,” she notes. “I believe creating opportunities for people from all backgrounds to pursue their ideas will drive innovation and help build a stronger society.”
Beyond her tenured position at a top-tier research university and founding our company, Rada has won numerous awards for her many accomplishments, including the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers from President Obama in 2010 and the Honorary Citizen award from her hometown of Cluj-Napoca, Romania. She loves traveling and reading, and she’s also a natural mirror writer!
Spencer Vagg
Spencer Vagg, Initium’s co-founder and CTO, met Rada while taking her Information Retrieval class at the University of Michigan and has worked with her ever since! Previously a Principal Investigator on multiple grants and an NSF research assistant, Spencer’s passionate about being able to help researchers spend less time on the administrative side of grants and more time focusing on their research. When he’s not busy helping to propel Initium to bigger and better heights, Spencer is usually traveling — he’s visited 40+ countries and counting!
Moses Lee
Our advisor Moses Lee is a self-described “serial entrepreneur”. Not only did he co-found the edtech company Seelio (which was eventually acquired by Keypath Education), he currently leads the Michigan Language Center with his wife and works as a Venture Partner for Spark Capital. At Spark, Moses first learned about Initium and Spencer and Rada, who he loves working with. As an advisor to the company, Moses helps us build our operations, engage more partners, and position our solution for greater adoption. When he’s not working, Moses is a passionate at-home barista.
Hustin Cao
Engineer Hustin Cao grew up in Ann Arbor, going to public schools from Scarlett to Huron and finally ending at the University of Michigan and says that “Ann Arbor is definitely where I feel most at home, even with all the cold winters and slippery roads!” While in school, he worked a variety of jobs from web development to a boba shop, where he received a burn scar from pouring boiling pudding on his knee! Luckily, Hustin found us through a job posting and has yet to sustain any burns from this position. He’s worked his way up from intern to Engineer, working primarily on creating and designing the web application for our users. He loves having a lot of control and flexibility over the code and iterating designs, but his favorite part is the team here.
Tanishka Nalawade
Tanishka Nalawade is a computer science major at the University of Michigan using her skills as Initium’s Data Science Intern. At Initium, Tanishka is working on automating metadata annotation for the grants Initium collects by analyzing grants in Initium’s databank, researching efficient automation methods, and identifying new grants. “I love the level of control I have over the project,” Tanishka adds. “I get to design and implement the entire system, which is really exciting.” Outside of her internship here, she works as an Instructional Assistant for an engineering class and loves to crochet and do her nails.
Caleb Hyun
Like Tanishka, Caleb Hyun is also a computer science major at the University of Michigan and is an Instructional Assistant for a practical data science class. His project as a Data Science Intern differs slightly — Caleb works on compiling the grants database, where he particularly enjoys the constant problem-solving the work requires and that he’s “able to come up with new solutions and ways to do things every day”. Originally from Seattle, Caleb loves hiking, backpacking, and playing pickleball, but his biggest claim to fame is that he was on PBS Kids in 3rd grade!
Katie Moore
One of the newest additions to Initium’s team, Katie Moore is the Social Media Intern! Katie is double majoring in International Studies and English and originally discovered Initium through Moses. “I think my favorite thing about Initium is the flexibility,” notes Katie. “I’m able to do it anywhere, any time, and work really closely with everyone in the company.” At the company, she adds, she schedules and drafts social media posts, composes newsletters, and creates the blogs (even this one!) In her free time, Katie loves to read and attempt to fulfill her lifelong goal of petting every cat in the world.
Initium wouldn’t be what it is today without every member of our team. Together, we make our platform — and each other! — better. We hope you like Initium, and stay tuned as we work together to bring even more updates and improvements, democratizing grant writing for years to come.
