Meter Feeder Looks to Do Away With Parking Tickets

pcmag.com:

Underrepresented entrepreneurs often face daunting challenges to get their startups off the ground. If you're looking to learn by example, a great place to start is Founders Unfound. Initially started by Dan Kihanya, a serial entrepreneur, the site tells the stories of startup founders of African descent. Kihanya records an hour-long podcast at least once a month that showcases a new startup and its founder. One of Kihanya's most interesting interviews is with Jim Gibbs, the co-founder and CEO of Meter Feeder, a startup that predicts parking availability and lets vehicles pay for parking with no human interaction.

Having grown up on Long Island, New York, Jim credits much of his success to parents that sacrificed much to nurture his talents in science and coding. All the hard work paid off, with Jim attending Carnegie Mellon and getting an internship at the Brookhaven national laboratory. He then did software development work for large companies, like USA Today and America Eagle. That time also fostered his love of Pittsburgh, where he currently resides and where he intends to build the next billion-dollar tech company.

"I may be from all the way out on Long Island, but then I came to Pittsburgh in '95 when I attended Carnegie Mellon. Once I was here, I found out I could get a two-bedroom apartment for 500 bucks a month," he says. "So essentially, I came out here for artificial intelligence and just stayed for the rent."

While attending university, Jim took a variety of jobs to make ends meet. His stories span work as a receptionist, entry-level JavaScript developer, and he even performed as a street dancer. But even after college, he felt like there was a large gap between the kinds of jobs he could get.

"I went and