Yingjie Yu — engineer, AI data scientist, chief technology officer, and co-Founder of Zeitro — has forged a path through multiple male-dominated worlds and wants to inspire other women to break boundaries too.

Her words of encouragement are direct and to the point: “You can do everything you want,” she said.

A native of China, Yu emigrated to the United States in 2016 to attend Santa Clara University for her graduate program in AI.

When Yu interviews candidates for engineering roles at Zeitro, which has developed an AI based mortgage origination platform, she sometimes notices women with less confidence than their male counterparts. What they need, she said, is faith in themselves and a belief in their own abilities.

She came by this wisdom after getting her Santa Clara, California business on the forefront, despite its near demise. Along the way, she embraced management and is in charge of a 13-member team, including coders and designers, but when she stepped into the role, she was not familiar with leadership. To succeed she knew she had to be heard, which, for starters, meant learning to speak up more in meetings, especially when she’s the sole tech-pro or female in attendance. For that, she watched and learned from Zeitro’s CEO and co-founder Bochen Wang, who has a way with words and can be very persuasive.

“I just observe what he does and think about my style and just repeat and practice,” she said.

Also from China, Wang first came to the U.S. in 2010 to complete his undergraduate work at Michigan State University.

Yu and Wang started working together about six years ago and have built Zeitro from the ground up.

Today, the system they developed is used by 3,000 mortgage offices in the country. From 2020 to 2022, however, the company faced a legal crisis that led to financial troubles. Money was so tight Yu and Wang laid off most of their employees. When the CTO and vice president of engineering departed, Yu was left to fill the gaps.

Her quick comprehension of how to be a good leader was no surprise to Wang, who noted that despite having no English in grad school, Yu was the “smartest guy” (sic) with top grades and is now the best engineer he knows.

As Yu grew professionally, she became “a very comprehensive CTO” while “carrying all of the development, the pricing, the AI, everything,” Wang said. She also acquired a knack for mortgages.

In addition, she gave him a shoulder to lean on, supporting him mentally while they were dealing with the potential loss of the company.

“I always tell people without Yingjie, there’s no Zeitro,” he said. “She’s the person I know that’s the most knowledgeable in AI and software development.”

While she may have been a quick study, becoming the boss wasn’t easy, Yu said. Used to following other people’s lead, she questioned her ability to take charge. As she gained confidence, she was able to see herself in the role by honing in on her innate resilience.

“I think that sometimes I have a lot of emotions like fear or anxiety, but I always cannot be affected by these emotions,” she said. “And just let them pass away quickly and go back to work fairly quickly and make things work.”

Yu and Wang are working on scale with the goal of surmounting 10 times their current market in the next two to three years.

Zeitro’s platform cuts back on paper and time, they said. For example, their debt-to-income calculator shortens document review time to five minutes, a task that can take from three to five hours without the tech. It also reduces software costs by 70%, from $100,000-plus to about $30,000.

Yu started in finances, getting her undergraduate degree in Shanghai. At Santa Clara University, she received a graduate degree in coding and business technology with the plan to fuse technology with finance.

She met Wang in grad school. While enrolled in a program on anime, they began working together, Yu taking charge of all things tech and Wang doing everything else.

At Zeitro, Yu spends about half the day coding and the rest talking to developers and designers.

“I spend a lot of time coding,” she said.

Also a developer, when the need arises, she takes on development tasks.

As the company prepares new features, she checks progress and addresses deadline issues. When a feature is ready, she reviews and releases it onto the platform.

While surmounting professional challenges, the duo has taken on the nuances of American society, which stand out from how they were raised. Yu’s focus on technology allows her to stay on the periphery, making the transition less jarring, she said. Wang, on the other hand, endures “more cultural shocks.”

“I feel even if I fail, I can do something else. I just can take more risks and do whatever I want.”

American self-dependence was a particular contrast.

“In China, we’re growing in a team; we’re growing in a community. When we’re doing things, we’re not only thinking about ourselves,” he said. “We think about the team, we think about the community, that’s our culture.”

To form a community culture at Zeitro, Wang and Yu pulled together a diverse team from countries including the U.S, China, South America, and Russia.

Friends and family are supportive Yu said. When she hits a snag, her parents remind her to have faith in herself, which “helps me a lot.”

One thing she is not worried about is failure.

“I feel even if I fail, I can do something else,” she said. “I just can take more risks and do whatever I want.”

Totally focused on her vocation, she said her bigger issue is finding work-life balance.

“Sometimes I think about work 100% of the time,” she said. “I think that is not very healthy.”

She enjoys playing tennis and wants more time to practice.

In her spare time, she also develops IOS Apps and is working on one that tracks menstrual cycles to help women understand why they sometimes feel heightened anxiety or emotion.

She has also developed an app that lets tennis players track their practices, which the “super talented engineer” completed overnight and offers for free, according to Wang.

“She has a very good heart,” he said. “She wants to help others.”

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