Aaron Kemp
Co-founder
Aaron is a builder, husband, and father. After many years at BlackBerry, Google, and Verily, he left to start Poppy and build products that are simpler, safer, and genuinely helpful for families.
Our story
We started with the same problem many parents face: how to bring our children into the digital world without the danger that come with smartphones?
We wanted to give our children the same kind of independence we had growing up, a time when we could just pick up the phone to call family and friends, or go online to learn about anything.
Large language models had opened up new possibilities for creating a device that could be simple and safe, without the downsides of a screen.
We couldn't find anything like what we wanted on the market, so we built it ourselves.
Our team
We're a small team in Waterloo, Canada building with direct input from families (including our own).
We're drawing on decades of experience in industry to take a different approach to building a consumer product. No giant team, no sales or marketing force. Just us, building something we love.
Jay Shah
Co-founder
Jay loves turning chaos into creation. Outside of spending time with his family, his focus is on Poppy, building wholesome products that families love. His passion for building has been cultivated by his work at startups, co-founding a prior company and coaching 100s of early stage entrepreneurs.
Our principles
Simple is better
Parents don't need more to do and children don't need more distractions. Our goal is to solve real problems with as little complexity as possible.
Focus matters
We would much rather do a small number of things really, really well than a larger number of things 'just okay'.
Humans first
Our products use AI, but our goal is to create meaningful connections between people, not between people and machines.
Our future
It's still very early in our story.
We keep building, learning, and improving with feedback from parents, grandparents, and friends. Every update is focused on making meaningful connection easier and safer.
If you have thoughts, questions, or just want to say hi, we'd love to hear from you.
Ready to ditch the screen?
Join other families who are choosing a screen-free way to stay in touch.