From Connected Cars to Mental Health: Ivan Mishanin's Journey as a Co-Founder and Tech Leader

As a seasoned tech entrepreneur, Ivan Mishanin co-founded and served as the CEO of Bright Box, a globally connected car software vendor, for over 8 years.

The company reached a staggering $10M in annual revenue before being acquired by Zurich Insurance Group, which was ranked 79th in the Global 2000 Forbes rating.

Currently, Ivan is the COO and co-founder at Brainify.AI, a cutting-edge company revolutionizing the drug development process for depression and other psychiatric disorders.

In the interview, we discussed the challenges of being a tech entrepreneur and key strategies of transforming the company’s growth around the globe.

Let’s talk about Bright Box. What market did you start with, and when?

I established Bright Box in 2012 as an IT company that focuses on solutions and platforms in the connected car market. By the end of 2014, we were in the final stages of negotiations with a few Eastern European auto companies.

We also managed to secure $1.5 million in investments from the LETA Capital venture fund. 

However, at the time, the Eastern European markets experienced a downturn that became a real issue for our business.

To bounce back and find clients quickly, we leveraged all available channels, including networking through friends, participating in exhibitions, and attending conferences worldwide.

At one such event, the Connected Cars conference in Amsterdam, we met potential partners from the Middle East, and after seven months, we won our first significant contract with Nissan in the region for three years and 45,000 cars.

How did you transform the company once it started developing in other markets? 

As we began expanding into other markets, we had to transform the company in several ways to adapt to the unique challenges and requirements of each region. Here are some of the changes we made:

Adjusting our team's schedule. Since the work week in the Middle East is from Sunday to Thursday, we adjusted our team's schedule to provide support on Sundays.

This required some effort and incurred minor additional costs, but it was crucial for meeting our clients' expectations in the region.

Adapting our product to the market. We began focusing more on achieving a better product-market fit by tailoring our product to the specific needs and demands of the new market.

This involved understanding the unique preferences and requirements of local customers and adjusting our offerings accordingly.

For instance, we added right-to-left writing and Arabic language support for the Middle East market, and we integrated Baidu Maps and the Chinese version of Microsoft Azure for the Chinese market.

Restructuring the product team. As our growth continued, we realized that having a single product team for all regions was not feasible. To address this issue, we split the team into two parts: Core and Regional.

The Core team was responsible for implementing technological and infrastructure changes that would simplify market adoption, while the Regional teams were responsible for catering to the specific needs of each country or region.

Overcoming language barriers. Not all of our team members, including myself, spoke fluent English at that time, so we had to work on improving our language skills to facilitate effective communication in the international market.

To improve my English, I began watching movies exclusively in English with subtitles during my flights, which helped me become familiar with conversational language.

Additionally, I changed the language settings in all my operating systems and software to English and used a dictionary on my iPhone to look up unfamiliar words.

I also started reading books in English, which helped me expand my vocabulary and grasp sentence structure.

Traveling. In 2014-2015, I took around 100-120 flights per year to support our expansion efforts and maintain close communication with our teams across the globe. 

Learning about local culture and market needs. My team and I began investing more time in understanding the culture and specific needs of the market we were entering.

This knowledge allowed us to better connect with our customers, partners, and stakeholders in the region and ultimately helped us succeed in our international expansion efforts.

Wow, that’s a lot of traveling! What are a few crucial things you did when expanding Bright Box into new markets? Did you have to move to the country yourself? 

It's essential to prioritize and make some tough decisions. As a founder, you don't necessarily have to move to the country yourself.

However, in my case, I decided that the success of the company was my top priority — even more important than my personal life or family.

As a result, I made sacrifices in my personal life to focus on the company's growth.

For many years, I didn't have a stable home. I lived out of my suitcase and occasionally spent weekends in an apartment.

This level of commitment and dedication was necessary for me to ensure the success of our international expansion.

To keep our team motivated and focused on the goals, I did everything I could to convey the importance of our work and why we needed to put in the extra effort.

I believe that this motivation and a shared sense of purpose played a crucial role in our eventual success in expanding into new markets.

In 2017, Zurich Insurance Group acquired your company, Bright Box, for $75M. Can you share some of your experience of how it feels to grow your company from scratch and be able to sell it to one of the largest companies in the world?

As the ex-founder and ex-CEO of Bright Box, I can attest to the fact that building a company from scratch and eventually selling it to a global giant like Zurich Insurance Group for $75 million in 2017 was an emotional rollercoaster filled with unique experiences and valuable lessons. 

Initially, I was over the moon with excitement, knowing that all the hard work had paid off and our company was being acquired by an industry leader.

However, this excitement was soon followed by a profound sense of loss and emptiness. It felt like I had given away a part of myself, something I had nurtured and grown from the ground up.

The realization that I was no longer in complete control of my "baby" hit hard and left me feeling adrift for some time. 

After the acquisition, I found myself in a familiar yet changed role.

While I continued as the CEO of the company, my decision-making power was reduced, and the ability to make bold moves to propel the company forward quickly became more limited. 

Nevertheless, I believe that selling your company can be the right decision and a new chapter in your life. Based on my experience, I would like to offer the following advice to those who aspire to a successful exit: 

Embrace change: Understand that selling your company is a significant milestone and the start of a new phase in your life.

You may venture into new industries or explore new spaces, but remember that your experience as a founder will always stay with you. 

Be prepared for a shift in dynamics: As a founder, you're used to having control and making critical decisions.

However, after an acquisition, you may need to adapt to a new corporate structure where you have less autonomy. Prepare yourself mentally for this transition. 

Negotiate a reasonable transition period: When selling your company, try to avoid a lengthy transition period.

As a founder, your entrepreneurial spirit might not align with the role of an employee, even if it's at the company you founded.

Ensure that the terms of the acquisition allow you to move on to new ventures in a timely manner. 

In conclusion, selling a company can be a bittersweet experience, filled with emotional highs and lows.

Embrace the change, learn from the experience, and continue to innovate as you embark on your next entrepreneurial journey.

Let’s talk a bit about your current project, a deep tech startup, Brainify.AI? How did the idea come about?

In 2020, I experienced depression firsthand and was taken aback by the subjective nature of psychiatry. When you have chest pain, a doctor will scan your heart and conduct blood tests, but no one was able to scan my brain.

My co-founder Mariam, a neuroscientist from Harvard, had pitched the idea of precision psychiatry to me earlier, but it didn't resonate with me at the time.

However, once I went through depression and started feeling better, I immediately recognized the huge need for a more objective approach to mental health. 

Brainify.AI is an AI/ML electroencephalography (EEG) biomarker platform for depression treatment response prediction that increases the likelihood of new drug approval by 80% and reduces R&D costs.

Our products, PlaceboInsight AI, TherapyInsight AI, and CleanSpectrum AI, are designed to enhance the efficiency of clinical trials and improve patient outcomes.

We identify biomarkers that predict treatment response during clinical phase 2, use them to select patients for clinical phase 3 trials, and predict placebo response in phase 2 and phase 3 to increase the likelihood of drug approval.

Brainify.AI’s long-term goal is to be the go-to biomarker platform for drug development and in-clinic diagnostics.

Our product relies on two decades of scientific research in psychiatry, neuroscience, and psychopharmacology. Like many other scientists, we want to be able to recommend the best treatment approach for different groups of patients.

However, most importantly, we want to identify “state-markers,” which can be used as the indicator of the treatment results and patient state.

By predicting treatment responses, Brainify.AI can become the go-to biomarker platform for drug development and in-clinic diagnostics, ultimately impacting over one billion people affected by psychiatric disorders worldwide.

To achieve this goal, we are collaborating with scientists from institutions like Harvard Medical School, Cornell University, Massachusetts General Hospital, and Northwell Health.

What are the next goals for Brainify.AI?

As we accumulate more data and refine our algorithms, we can expect a future where mental health treatment is no longer a one-size-fits-all approach, but rather a highly personalized experience designed to maximize recovery and overall well-being.

Companion diagnostics have proven to be incredibly effective in oncology, and I expect to see the same situation play out in CNS over the next 10 years.

We are now at the forefront of this shift toward personalized medicine in mental health.

Our cutting-edge AI and machine learning techniques allow us to develop innovative solutions that can help people lead happier and healthier lives.

This revolution in care will not only increase the success rate of depression treatments but also offer hope and a better quality of life to millions of people around the globe.

We are excited to be a part of this journey and look forward to the advancements yet to come.