Amitt Mahajan

2012 Young Alumni Achievement Award

Amitt Mahajan (BS '06) began his career as a programmer with Epic Games, where he performed tools development for Unreal Engine 3, and he helped develop Gears of War, a critically acclaimed and best-selling Xbox 360 game. In 2007, he reunited with fellow Illinois alumni to co-found MyMiniLife, Inc.

As Zynga’s director of engineering, Mahajan led a team of 15 developers, implementing the scalable technology stack and game engine used in FarmVille, as well as other Zynga games such as CityVille, Treasure Isle, and FrontierVille. He also spent nine months as chief technology officer of Zynga Japan.

In 2012, he left Zynga and started Red Hot Labs with Illinois classmate and long-time business partner Joel Poloney. A Bay-Area company, Red Hot Labs builds fun mobile products. As CEO, Mahajan is focused on revolutionizing the way mobile applications are developed.