Kevin Grant is a native of Nottingham England and spent his early years living in Berlin (Germany), Kansas City (U.S.A.), and finally settled in Toronto Canada at age 14. This early life experience traveling the world had a lasting effect and exposed Kevin to a more global understanding of culture and human differences. This primed Kevin for an “out of the box” thinking style that is the trademark of his life.

Surrounded by Technology

Technology and science was absorbed almost osmotically by Kevin while growing up with parents who were scientists and educators. His father (David J.W. Grant) was a well respected pharmaceutical research chemist and his childhood home was always filled with computer equipment, scientific instruments, and technology books. One of Kevin’s earliest childhood memories was playing a primitive asteroids video game on an Apple IIc computer.

The Early Internet Years

The Internet began as a system of connected academic computers scattered across university campuses around the world. Thanks to Kevin’s Father, he had access to the Internet well before any of his childhood peers. Many nights were spent hearing the chirping of a modem connecting to the University mainframe system using the embryonic web browsers called Mosaic. At that time, there were only cryptic academic websites to browse, nevertheless, the Internet had captured Kevin’s imagination.

Cognitive Psychology and UI Design

Kevin completed high school excelling in graphic arts and design while attending an arts high school called Earl Haig Secondary School in Toronto. His post-secondary education began by attended University of Toronto and then York University in Toronto. He eventually completing a Master’s Degree in Clinical Psychology with a focus on cognitive psychology. Kevin perfected his understanding of human perception, thinking styles, visual scanning, and user interface design.

Building a Blog Site Before Blogs Existed

Kevin purchased his first computer, a Mac Plus, which he retrofitted with a hand-built microprocessor board using documents he found on the Internet.

In his quest to contribute better content, Kevin quickly learned how to build his own web pages. The first popular website Kevin built was a fan website for Donna Summer containing a blog, bio pages, and video clips. The site was entitled the “Donna Summer Internet Zone”. Fans from around the world shared information, images, and stories. This was truly a trailblazing effort. Donna Summer’s marketing team, based in Nashville, quickly became aware of the site In the summer of 1997.

Donna Summer was touring the US that year and the site became a hub for her tour dates. The band’s bass player contributed a weekly report from the tour trail. Inadvertently, Kevin had created one of the first celebrity publicity blogs.

Early Web Development and Design Tools

Later that year, Adobe began building a new software package called “Adobe PageMill” and needed experts to test the product. Adobe drew upon Kevin’s expertise to develop the software UI and functionality. This marked the beginning of a three year affiliation with Adobe. Kevin tested early design and web development tools including Dreamweaver, Photoshop, and Illustrator. He supplemented his income selling Macintosh computers at the local Micro Boutique Store in Toronto. Adobe even featured Kevin’s company “In2It Design” in their customer business bulletin in 1998.

The Webmaster Years

Kevin had all the skills to be a webmaster before the title “webmaster” existed. He was approached by a start-up company funded by the Globe and Mail called PointCast. PointCast created a screen saver that graphically presented news, information, weather, and entertainment content when the computer was idle. The software pioneered the use of XML to send data directly to this innovative software. Kevin quickly became an expert in XML technologies. He presented at numerous technology conferences in Canada and contributed to todays popular RSS feed standard.

Building Innovative Internet Services

In 1999, Kevin joined Microsoft Canada to lead a start-up project called MSN. Windows XP was under development at the time. Microsoft’s strategy was to integrate rich Internet information services into the new operating system. Windows XP brought the Internet to forefront of Microsoft’s new OS. Kevin was integral to leading MSN to become the number one Internet portals and instant messaging provider in Canada by 2005.

In 2005, Bell Sympatico turned to MSN at the peak of the Canadian Internet services competitive battle between Bell and Rogers. Both Internet service providers were clambering for a strategic advantage. The trend at the time was to follow the lead of Time Warner AOL with the introduction of exclusive Internet services to add value to build customer loyalty. Kevin worked closely with Seattle-based MSN partner development teams putting together the technical aspects of what came to be a multi-million dollar deal (this remains one of the largest MSN deals).

The strategic components of the Sympatico / MSN deal was a software product called ‘MSN Explorer’. MSN Explorer was a desktop application that combined MSN Messenger, Hotmail, Outlook, antivirus, web browsing, parental controls, and news into a tightly integrated software suite. Kevin was assigned as the Product Marketing Manager for the MSN Explorer project in 2006. The software offered a distinct strategic advantage over what Yahoo and Rogers eventually launched 6 months later.

Launching a Mobile Media Start-up

After his work at Microsoft was completed in 2007, Kevin freelanced for two years and immersed himself in the Toronto digital media communities. In his spare time, Kevin developed an innovative retro club dance music site called Club XGen (http://clubxgen.com). The site’s traffic soared because the it was designed to fully support smartphones with video and radio formatted specifically for mobile delivery. It was one of the only mobile smartphone video portals in 2007. The success of Club XGen’s mobile website inspired Kevin to launch SmartAirMedia.

In the Fall of 2009 Kevin was accepted into the Toronto Business Development Centre’s Self-Employment program funded by the Canadian Federal Government. This “think tank” helped Kevin build a comprehensive business plan that evolved into the company’s niche-- ‘mobile media experts’.

A History of Innovation

Kevin’s 15+ years in the Internet and media industries demonstrates consistent forward-thinking vision and innovation that has taken him on an exhilarating journey developing early web standards, pioneering XML data technology, building tightly integrated Internet services, and finally working at the frontiers of mobile media and smartphone broadcasting and communication.

Career Chronology

2007 - 2008

BlipBroadcast • Freelance Digital Media Producer & Project Manager

Programmed using MySQL PHP, build video streaming websites, and produced complex digital media rich Internet destinations; including Flash

2004 - 2007

Microsoft Network (MSN) & Bel Sympatico • Senior Product Manager

Managed a major partners teams and MSN product teams to develop Internet subscription and safety services as well as consumer music & video entertainment services

2003 - 2004

Microsoft Network (MSN) • Product Manager

Led a team of technical and marketing professionals creating product roadmaps and project business plans for MSN and Internet safety and subscription services

2000 - 2003

Microsoft Network (MSN) • Technical Project Manager, Toronto

Launched highly profitable MSN subscription services for such products as MSN Hotmail extra storage, MSN Premium, and MSN Messenger Designed new MSN portal advertising and informational services to significantly increase site traffic and exceeding MSN portal web site revenue targets

1998 - 2000

Bell Canada • Business Analyst

Initiated technical requirements and business requirements that enabled customers to managed their Bell services on the Internet Identified, planned, and prioritized the product roadmap and feature for future services

1997 - 1998

Netscape Worldwide Consulting • Systems Engineer

Installed and configured email, directory, e-commerce, and calendaring servers as a consultant for large corporate customers

1995 - 1997

Pointcast (a division of the Globe & Mail) • Senior Webmaster

Webmaster for Pointcast Canada’s English and French website