焕 Kelvin Chen ~/nyc

product manager · builder · new york

A life designed to feel alive — not just accomplished.

I'm Kelvin. Principal PM at US Mobile, where I own the activation platform every customer passes through, plus Multi-Network and Starlink. The rest of the time: building small AI systems that run my life, chasing shuttlecocks, and answering to a miniature poodle.

焕

焕 (huàn) — to shine, to renew.
the name was the thesis all along.

vibe coding past midnight / built a system to catch myself over-building / spin class, but make it a warehouse rave / she commutes by sling / thousands of coffee orders and counting /

the four of me

↓ scroll — four real photos, stacking one over the last

build造

Systems by day, tools by night — two ways of building, one person.

move动

Badminton, pickleball, skiing, cycling — training for stronger, not just normal.

yumi暖

暖暖 — miniature poodle, and the one member of this house the design system doesn't apply to.

host聚

Demo nights, PM meetups, dinners that run late — with a standing goal of hosting one myself every month.

Kelvin smiling at an outdoor festival at golden hour

about

More than the day job.

By day I'm a Principal PM at US Mobile — one of the largest independent wireless carriers in the U.S., 1.1M+ subscribers, Consumer Reports' #1 carrier two years running. I own activation and line operations, plus the connectivity programs built on top of it: Multi-Network, Starlink, and wearables.

I've sat on the other side of the table too: I co-founded RizzPolicy, an AI-powered insurance marketplace, got it licensed in four states — then wound it down when the real constraint turned out to be supply, not demand. And when a process annoys me, I build the tool — a habit that has shipped internal apps at work and the personal OS that actually runs my life.

Off the clock: weekend badminton and pickleball, more gatherings than my calendar approves of, and answering to Yumi(暖暖), a miniature poodle with strong opinions.

The throughline: design the system, then actually live in it.

selected work

Things I've shipped.

The day-job flagships and the after-hours builds.

us mobile

Multi-network

One line, premium data across all three national US networks — my pod's flagship product. As of this week, your watch can ride along on it.

featured: android authority ↗

us mobile

Starlink One

Cellular on every major network plus Starlink home internet, bundled into one plan — coverage from the ground and from space. My side of it: engineering and operations for the launch.

covered: yahoo finance ↗

us mobile

eSIM activation

From "wait for a SIM kit" to connected in under two minutes. I rebuilt eSIM activation until it went from an unreliable first try to close to automatic.

how it changed the game ↗

founder

RizzPolicy

Co-founded an AI-powered insurance marketplace, licensed in four states — then wound it down when the diagnosis came back clear: the constraint was supply, not demand. Ad spend was converting into declined underwriting, not policies. Chose to stop rather than raise against a structural problem.

after hours

Reimbursify

Expense reimbursements without the spreadsheet ritual. Built solo in about two months, now running across the office — for under $30/month against a $2,200+/month commercial alternative.

the inner workings, on the company blog ↗

after hours

Party

Live polls for house parties. Guests join from their phones with a five-character code, the results land on the TV, and the host runs the night from a control room. Built for the gatherings I keep saying I'll host.

party.kelvin-chen.com ↗

after hours

RaveTickets

A personal ticket radar for NYC electronic music — it watches artists, venues and promoters across resale and discovery sites, and flags new shows and good deals. Checks every ten minutes, so I don't have to.

open source

Personal OS skills

Portable Claude Code skills pulled out of my personal OS — plain-markdown playbooks for automation safety, note rendering, health records and portfolio theses. Copy a folder, and the assistant acts like a specialist.

on github ↗

four ways I spend myself

Build · Move · Yumi · Host

A few numbers that explain me faster than a résumé:

6 places
flown to this year: amsterdam · barcelona · hawaii · coachella · pakistan · dubai
1 organ short
gallbladder removed — and I run at full speed without it

soundEDM first, everything else after — Coachella attended, Odesza tickets bought on impulse, lessons taken seriously

speedF1 race weekends watched religiously · a long-standing love of driving

seasonsskiing in winter · cycling the rest — elbow surgically rebuilt in May, cleared to lift in August, back on the road by winter

resilienceone gallbladder lighter and bounced back fast — same plan for the elbow, but stronger than before

Kelvin at a desk with a laptop while Yumi the miniature poodle supervises
build

Small tools, shipped fast

A personal OS of agents that write my briefs, watch my goals, and keep life legible. Supervisor pictured.

Kelvin sitting courtside at an international badminton tournament with his gear
move

Badminton & pickleball

Studio cycling and strength classes around the city while the elbow finishes healing — plus a first try at padel. Courts are next; the goal is stronger than before, not back to baseline.

Yumi, a white miniature poodle with a pink collar, looking at the camera
yumi

暖暖 (Yumi)

Miniature poodle. Supervises build sessions from the desk, commutes by sling, photographed more than I am.

meet 暖暖 →

A room of people watching live demos at an AI show-and-tell gathering
gather

Out most weeks

Demo nights, PM meetups, dinners that run long — dozens of gatherings since May, and a standing goal of pulling one together myself each month.

the system

I run my life on software I wrote.

Every morning at 7:00, an agent has already read my data, written my brief, updated my dashboards, and nagged me about the task board. The de-identified version is public — clone it and make it yours.

my data→health · money · people · notes→agent fleet→crons + skills→outputs→morning brief · dashboards · task board
starter
kit →
featured — free, no signup, no tracking

Personal OS starter kit

A file-based knowledgebase, agent task prompts, and daily report generators. A walkthrough plus a downloadable kit.

in the wild

Out in the world.

a minaret at dusk — lahore
The Burj Khalifa lit up at night, seen from below with palm fronds in the corner
first time in dubai — just walking around
Kelvin on a padel court at night, holding a padel racket
first padel game — pakistan
open road — canada, en route to montréal
Walking through New York on the way to the dog Halloween parade
to the dog halloween parade, via bubble tea
sharks, actually — hawaii
Kelvin standing in a golden field at sunset in Hawaii, holding a hat
golden hour, hawaii — no agenda
Kelvin jumping with both arms raised on the yellow centerline of an empty foggy road
feeling alive — vancouver
Kelvin mid-game at pickleball
pickleball night
Kelvin with a camera among autumn foliage in Newport, Rhode Island
leaf season — newport, rhode island
yumi ear-tracking study, n=1
rainbow, mid-ocean — hawaii
Kelvin in the crowd at sunset at Coachella
sunset at coachella

← scroll →

now

Current status.

  • runningDaily life on the personal OS — automated briefs, reports, and a task board the agents keep honest
  • rebuildingElbow surgery in May, cleared to lift in August, two 5Ks in October — with a target of better than before by 2027
  • just backFrom a week with the team in Lahore and Karachi — plus my first time in Dubai
  • writingOne note a month on /notes — №7 just shipped. Say hi if you're building too