Who We Are
We have a passion for making things that people love.
Read more about Penzu and the team behind it.
What is Penzu?
Penzu is a secure, online diary and personal journaling platform designed with privacy as its top priority. It provides a seamless and engaging user experience, making it as intuitive and straightforward to write online as it is to write on paper. With its commitment to protecting users' personal reflections and ideas, Penzu offers a unique solution for individuals seeking privacy in their digital journaling practice.
What is Penzu?
Have you ever wondered why there isn’t an easy, secure way to record your thoughts online? Many of the current online journaling options are either cumbersome, overloaded with features, or simply not designed for private writing. Why risk keeping a personal journal on a public blogging platform? While alternatives like desktop computers or notepad apps are viable options, they aren’t foolproof when it comes to privacy and security.
Penzu solves this problem by offering a highly secure platform to store your personal thoughts and ideas in the cloud. Entries are not only password-protected, but individual journal entries can also be locked with military-grade encryption, ensuring top-tier privacy.
Penzu excels in both security and user-friendliness. The platform’s core design element, the Pad, serves as a metaphor for a traditional writing pad, making it universally accessible and intuitive. This simple yet powerful design has helped Penzu overcome language and cultural barriers, allowing users from over 170 countries to connect with the service. With an unwavering commitment to an exceptional user experience, Penzu stands out in an industry filled with complex, often overwhelming alternatives.
The name "Penzu" is derived from the Latin word "pensare," which means "to think" or "to be full of thought," reflecting the essence of the platform as a space to capture and reflect on one’s ideas.
The Team
President & Founder
Alexander Mimran founded Penzu to address a personal challenge: the lack of a secure space to keep thoughts and reflections online. After spending a year working on the project during evenings and weekends, Alexander launched a minimal viable product, which quickly attracted interest from passionate journalers. Over time, Penzu has gained a loyal user base worldwide, who rely on the platform to record their personal stories and experiences.
With a background in product development and marketing, Alexander is the driving force behind Penzu’s growth. Before founding Penzu, he worked as a freelance graphic designer and branding consultant, helping startups and small businesses establish their identities. His vision for Penzu is to transform it into the leading digital alternative to traditional pen and paper, a tool that becomes an essential part of modern life as technology continues to reshape how we communicate. After all, paper has been in use since the 2nd century BC.
Co-founder & Lead Developer
Mike Lawlor has been with Penzu since its inception and is an expert in all aspects of web technology. With a background in Artificial Intelligence, Mike has a broad range of experience, including domain registration, web hosting, e-commerce, mobile social networks, user-driven content, and cloud computing.
What began as a side project for Mike to demonstrate and expand his technical skills has now evolved into a widely successful global platform. Penzu’s perfect balance of an intuitive, user-friendly interface and robust backend architecture is a testament to Mike’s expertise and dedication.
Senior Developer
Simon Wilkinson brings a wealth of experience in customer-focused solutions and cutting-edge product development to the Penzu team. With a Master’s and Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from Carleton University in Ottawa, Simon has worked on various high-level projects, including using swarm intelligence to enhance the security of communications in anonymous networks.
His expertise spans a range of areas, from service quality assurance for wireless broadband networks to enterprise systems management automation. Simon’s technical proficiency and commitment to delivering innovative solutions make him an invaluable member of the Penzu team.