The Linkedin Mafia

ivelina

Published

October 10, 2024

In our weekly tech mafia series we cover the biggest tech mafias in Silicon Valley and beyond, taking a closer look at what companies former employees have started, how much money they’ve raised, and who their investors are.

What is a tech mafia group?

Disruptive startups like PayPal have produced a line of ex employees who go on to start their own influential startups. For example, employees who worked at PayPal went on to found companies like LinkedIn and YouTube.

The Linkedin Mafia

This week we cover the top 50 startups founded by former employees of Linkedin, including rising stars.

Quick stats on the Linkedin Mafia:‍

Total number of companies founded: 244
Total amount of money raised: $8.2 billion

Below is a breakdown of the top movers and shakers, followed by the rising stars of the Linkedin Mafia. You'll recognize some popular names like SuperHuman, Color, and Inflection AI.

Companies Covered:

‍Tortoise
Curated
Ratio‍
Celery
Color
SuperHuman
Merge
StarTree‍
TrueWork
Quartic AI
KarmaCheck
Inflection AI
Blavity
Bicycle Health
Path
OpenLattice
OpenStore
AgentSync
Truepill
MainStreet
Split Software
Personal AI
Figma
Esusu
Doorstead
Canal
Galileo
Acryl Data
Anomalo
OuterBounds
Drip
Cricket Health
Fitbod
Accord
TrueWork
Hub
Growing IO
Holberton School
EdgeCloudLink
Jelled
Neura Health
Magical
Deep Discovery
Presdo
Samooha
Cosell
Ambient.ai

Color

Founder: Nish Bhat
LinkedIn Role: Software Engineering Intern
Capital Raised: $482M
Investors: General Catalyst
Stage: Series E

Color Health is a leading provider of infrastructure for durable and equitable public health.

Superhuman

Founder: Conrad Irwin, Rahul Vohra
LinkedIn Role: Senior Software Engineer, LinkedIn Intro
Capital Raised: $108M
Investors: First Round Capital
Stage: Series C

Superhuman offers a powerful and fast email experience that enables users to navigate their inbox with remarkable speed.

Merge

Founder: Gil Feig
LinkedIn Role: Senior Software Engineer
Capital Raised: $74.5M
Investors: NEA
Stage: Series B

Merge integrates HR, payroll, recruiting, accounting, ticketing, and CRM platforms into a unified API.

StarTree

Founder: Kishore Gopalakrishna, Xiang Fu
LinkedIn Role: Senior Staff Engineer, Senior Software Engineer
Capital Raised: $75M
Investors: GGV Capital
Stage: Series B

StarTree is a cloud-based software company that empowers businesses to extract advanced insights from real-time and historical data. Founded by the core engineering team behind Apache PinotTM, StarTree's platform is utilised by leading companies such as LinkedIn, Uber, Target, Etsy, and Walmart.

Curated

Founder: Peter Ombres, Alex Vauthey, Annabel Liu, Eduardo Vivas
LinkedIn Role: Senior Director Corporate Development, VP Engineering, Head of Product
Capital Raised: $141.5M
Investors: Greylock
Stage: Series C

Founded in 2017, Curated is an online shopping platform dedicated to humanizing the shopping experience.

Ratio

Founder: Mason Blake
LinkedIn Role: Marketplaces Engineering Leader
Capital Raised: $415.3M
Investors: Streamlined Ventures
Stage: Series C

Ratio is a FinTech platform for SaaS and technology companies, offering integrated financing, payments, and predictive pricing.

Inflection AI

Founder: Reid Hoffman
LinkedIn Role: Executive Chairman and co-Founder
Capital Raised: $1.5B
Investors: Bill Gates
Stage: Series B

Inflection AI is an artificial intelligence startup that develops personal AI chatbots.

Blavity

Founder: Jonathan Jackson
LinkedIn Role: Editor
Capital Raised: $9.4M
Investors: Google Ventures
Stage: Series A

Blavity Inc. builds solutions for Black consumers and enterprises. With brands like AfroTech and Blavity News, they reach over 250 million millennials per month, creating content and providing talent acquisition solutions for the Black community.

Bicycle Health

Founder: Ankit Gupta
LinkedIn Role: Principal Product Manager, Connectec Enterprise
Capital Raised: $87.3M
Investors: SignalFire
Stage: Series B

With prompt appointments, personalized care, and a supportive community, Bicycle Health empowers patients to overcome addiction, achieve positive outcomes, and build healthier lives.

Path

Founder: Gabriel Diop
LinkedIn Role: Sales Solution Specialist
Capital Raised: $110.9M
Investors: Upfront Ventures
Stage: Series B

Path is a healthtech company dedicated to making mental health care work for everyone.

OpenLattice

Founder: Hristo Oskov
LinkedIn Role: Senior Software Engineer
Capital Raised: $7.6M
Investors: Basis Set Ventures
Stage: Series A

OpenLattice is helping tackle mass incarceration and the opioid epidemic by enabling state and local governments to implement interventions based on data driven workflows deployed against structured data from across government systems.

Tortoise

Founder: Dmitry Shevelenko
LinkedIn Role: Product Management
Capital Raised: $11.1M
Investors: TA Ventures
Stage: Seed

Tortoise is a retail automation startup based in Mountain View, CA.

OpenStore

Founder: Keith Rabois
LinkedIn Role: Vice President, Business & Corporate Development
Capital Raised: $137M
Investors: Lux Capital
Stage: Series B

OpenStore's mission is to provide life-changing liquidity to ecommerce entrepreneurs.

AgentSync

Founder: Jenn Knight, Niranjan Sabharwal
LinkedIn Role: Manager, Global Sales Strategy
Capital Raised: $111.1M
Investors: Tiger Global
Stage: Series B

AgentSync revolutionizes insurance infrastructure by seamlessly connecting carriers, agencies, MGAs, and producers.

Truepill

Founder: Sid Viswanathan
LinkedIn Role: Product Manager
Capital Raised: $255.4M
Investors: Y Combinator
Stage: Series D

Truepill is a consumer healthcare company integrating telehealth and pharmacy systems, offering partners innovative solutions for convenient and accessible care.

MainStreet

Founder: Jackson Moses
LinkedIn Role: Business Leadership Program
Capital Raised: $64.7M
Investors: SignalFire
Stage: Series B

MainStreet simplifies the process of claiming startup-friendly R&D tax credits.

Ambient.ai

Founder: Vikesh Khanna
LinkedIn Role: Software Engineering Intern
Capital Raised: $52.1M
Investors: Y Combinator
Stage: Series A

Ambient.ai leverages computer vision and AI to transform enterprise security operations.

Split Software

Founder: Adil Aijaz
LinkedIn Role: Senior Staff Software Engineer
Capital Raised: $109.8M
Investors: Lightspeed Venture Partners
Stage: Series D

Split is a feature delivery platform based in Redwood City, California.

Figma

Founder: Dylan Field
LinkedIn Role: Data Analytics Intern
Capital Raised: $333.4M
Investors: Greylock
Stage: Series E

Figma is a powerful design platform that empowers teams to collaborate and create products together.

Esusu

Founder: Samir Goel
LinkedIn Role: Sales Strategy & Operations: Europe, Middle East & Africa
Capital Raised: $145M
Investors: Sinai Ventures
Stage: Series B

Esusu promotes financial health by reporting rental data for credit building and optimizing property performance.

Doorstead

Founder: Bernard Liang
LinkedIn Role: Senior Software Engineer
Capital Raised: $37.3M
Investors: M13
Stage: Series B

Doorstead, founded by a team from Uber and Y Combinator, revolutionizes property management with "iRenting."

Canal

Founder: Clay Schubiner
LinkedIn Role: Software Engineering Intern
Capital Raised: $27M
Investors: Forerunner Ventures
Stage: Series A

Canal is a distributed commerce platform that facilitates the retail or purchase of any product online.

Galileo

Founder: Atindriyo Sanyal
LinkedIn Role: Software Engineer - Intern
Capital Raised: $23.1M
Investors: Battery Ventures
Stage: Series A

Galileo is the leading ML data intelligence platform for data scientists handling unstructured data, which accounts for over 80% of the world's data.

Acryl Data

Founder: John Joyce, Shirshanka Das, Swaroop Jagadish
LinkedIn Role: Senior Software Engineer, Principal Staff Software Engineer
Capital Raised: $30M
Investors: 8VC
Stage: Series A

Acryl Data provides an enterprise-grade DataHub platform that offers a seamless and user-friendly experience for organizations to access and utilize their data efficiently.

Anomalo

Founder: Elliot Shmukler
LinkedIn Role: Senior Director, Product Management
Capital Raised: $39M
Investors: Foundation Capital
Stage: Series A

Anomalo allows users to continuously inspect and validate the data coming into their warehouses.

Outerbounds

Founder: Savin Goyal
LinkedIn Role: Software Engineer
Capital Raised: $24.3M
Investors: Foundation Capital
Stage: Series A

Outerbounds is dedicated to building a modern and human-centric infrastructure stack for machine learning.

Drip

Founder: Javaughn Lawrence
LinkedIn Role: Associate, Strategy and Operations
Capital Raised: $28.5M
Investors: Kindred Ventures
Stage: Series A

Drip provides the thrill of live commerce to NFTs, and physical collectibles.

Cricket Health

Founder: Arvind Rajan, James Chaukos
LinkedIn Role: Managing Director and VP, Business Operations
Capital Raised: $111.1M
Investors: First Round Capital
Stage: Series B

Cricket Health is dedicated to empowering individuals with kidney disease to live fulfilling lives.

Accord

Founder: Wayne Pan
LinkedIn Role: Director of Engineering
Capital Raised: $17M
Investors: Y Combinator
Stage: Series A

Accord is a Sales Execution Platform empowering over 100 GTM teams to achieve consistent deal execution.

Truework

Founder: Ryan Sandler, Victor Kabdebon
LinkedIn Role: Senior Product Manager, Product & Engineering Manager
Capital Raised: $118.9M
Investors: Sequoia Capital
Stage: Series C

Truework is a one-stop platform that helps banks, lenders, and others verify income and employment.

KarmaCheck

Founder: Eric Ly
LinkedIn Role: Co-Founder
Capital Raised: $19.2M
Investors: Index Ventures
Stage: Series A

KarmaCheck has disrupted traditional background checks by leveraging technology and AI. Real-time, actionable notifications empower quick hiring decisions, transforming the way background checks are conducted in the industry.

Samooha

Founder: Kamakshi Sivaramakrishnan
LinkedIn Role: Product
Capital Raised: $12.5M
Investors: Altimeter Capital
Stage: Series A

Samooha, based in Los Altos Hills, is a software development company that focuses on secure data collaboration for enterprises.

Quartic.ai

Founder: Pranav Prakash
LinkedIn Role: Senior Software Engineer
Capital Raised: $12M
Investors: Celesta Capital
Stage: Series A

Quartic.ai's Smart Industry platform empowers process manufacturing industries with AI and IIoT, enabling digital transformation and increased productivity.

Hub

Founder: Eric Ly
LinkedIn Role: Co-Founder
Capital Raised: $20M
Investors: DCVC
Stage: Seed

Hub is a blockchain based trust protocol that allows people to earn and carry their reputation data across Internet.

GrowingIO

Founder: Jonathan Wu, Justin M. Chen, Ximeng Zhang, Yuanming Shan
LinkedIn Role: Director, Senior Manager, Business Analytics
Capital Raised: $50M
Investors: Greylock
Stage: Series B

GrowingIO is a leading provider of comprehensive digital growth solutions in China. They offer products and consulting services, including customer data platforms, advertising and product analysis, and intelligent operations, to help businesses enhance their data-driven capabilities and achieve better growth in their digital transformation journey.

Holberton School

Founder: Sylvain Kalache
LinkedIn Role: Senior Site Reliability Engineer
Capital Raised: $32.5M
Investors: Redpoint
Stage: Series B

Holberton School is an alternative to college that focuses on project-based training for aspiring software engineers. It offers programs to train individuals to become full-stack software engineers, preparing them for careers in the tech industry.

Magical

Founder: Harpaul Sambhi
LinkedIn Role: Product Management
Capital Raised: $41M
Investors: Bain Capital Ventures
Stage: Series A

Magical is a top productivity app based in San Francisco that automates repetitive tasks, saving users over 7 hours per week.

Rising Stars

Fitbod

Founder: Jesse Venticinque
LinkedIn Role: Senior User Experience Designer
Capital Raised: $4.7M
Investors: Pear VC
Stage: Series B

Fitbod promotes lifelong fitness, using advanced technology to adapt workouts to users' abilities and goals.

EdgeCloudLink

Founder: Yuval Bachar
LinkedIn Role: Principal Engineer, Global Data Center Infrastructure Architecture and Strategy
Capital Raised: $10M
Investors: Molex Ventures
Stage: Seed

ECL is pioneering a new category of data centres by introducing the world's first fully-sustainable, hydrogen-powered, off-grid data centre-as-a-service. They provide IT services and consulting globally, offering environmentally friendly and efficient data centre solutions.

Jelled

Founder: Ruslan Belkin
LinkedIn Role: Sr. Director of Engineering, Content and Community Products
Capital Raised: $4.5M
Investors: Accel Partners
Stage: Seed

Jelled is an upcoming AI-first product designed specifically for companies. Based in Palo Alto, California, Jelled aims to provide a new kind of software development solution that prioritizes artificial intelligence technology.

Neura Health

Founder: Elizabeth Burstein
LinkedIn Role: Senior Product Manager, Learn to Code
Capital Raised: $10.3M
Investors: Norwest Venture Partners
Stage: Seed

Neura Health provides a patient-focused benefits solution for chronic neurological conditions.

Deep Discovery

Founder: Russell Jurney
LinkedIn Role: Senior Data Scientist
Capital Raised: $2.3M
Investors: Xfund
Stage: Seed

Deep Discovery is an AI system for fighting global corruption.

CoSell

Founder: Brendon Cassidy, Pete Ryan
LinkedIn Role: Director of Corporate Sales, Head of SMB Sales
Capital Raised: $2M
Investors: PivotNorth Capital
Stage: Pre-Seed

CoSell, based in Austin, Texas, is a software development company that specializes in unlocking the power of relationship-led growth. They provide a next-generation channel for go-to-market (GTM) teams, enabling them to leverage relationships to drive business growth.

Celery

Founder: Peter Shih
LinkedIn Role: Lead iPhone Developer
Capital Raised: $2.3M
Investors: Y Combinator
Stage: Seed

Celery is a versatile pre-order platform that helps businesses bring their products to market.

Personal.ai

Founder: Sharon Zhang
LinkedIn Role: Engineering Manager - Applied Sciences (Glint)
Capital Raised: $8.4M
Investors: Village Global
Stage: Seed

Personal.ai creates a personal AI that acts as a digital encyclopedia of your life, based on your individual data.