Who are the people behind Segpay? One of them is David Noel, a senior web developer who has made great contributions to products such as Segpay’s merchant portal, consumer portal, and reporting services (our API). David has been with Segpay for nearly two years now. We’ve all enjoyed getting to know him, and thought you might, too.
Where is your hometown?
I was born and raised on the beautiful Caribbean island of Grenada.
Why did you decide to come to Florida?
I came to the US for college, at Midwestern State University in Wichita Falls, Texas, which is about two hours from Dallas. Midwestern recruits heavily in the Caribbean (if you were wondering). From there, I headed to Florida to pursue my Master’s degree at UF (Go Gators!)
Where did you work previously?
Prior to Segpay, I worked for one of the big credit card brands, which I enjoyed a lot, but found that working in such a large organization put me farther away from the final work product than I liked, so I looked for a smaller, leaner environment and found it here at Segpay.
What is your professional background? Were you always in development?
I actually started my career teaching high school math. Taught for 2 years in Grenada, and 1 year in the US.. I always had a passion for breaking and fixing things, though, which led me to engineering.
Where do you see yourself in 5-10 years?
Building a software development incubator that focuses on empowering young people, particularly minorities and underrepresented groups, to develop amazing projects for the distributed ledger ecosystem (i.e., decentralized apps like bitcoin).
Any hobbies?
Travelling, water sports, spending time with friends and family, taking online courses to improve my skills, Apple products! I plan on getting back into Salsa dancing at some point, too. Oh, and weekly trips to Chick-fil-a for a Spicy Chicken sandwich (yes, that is a hobby). 🙂
Can you share something that most people don’t know about you?
I once had dinner with Her Majesty the Queen of England, and later with Price Charles. They are close, personal friends. 😉 Actually, I was able to meet them through family members who served in the British military.
Read any good books / watched any good shows lately?
Book: Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future. TV: The Last Kingdom (Netflix). Movie: Black Panther.
Who do you admire outside of work?
Barack Obama. Putting politics aside, he is a model father and husband, with true emotional intelligence and vision. Also, Elon Musk (see book recommendation above) because, come on, the guy just sent a car into space on a giant rocket! Musk is a true visionary and futurist.
