The OpenAI mafia: 18 startups founded by alumni

The OpenAI mafia: 18 startups founded by alumni

Move over, PayPal mafia: There’s a new tech mafia in Silicon Valley. As the startup behind ChatGPT, OpenAI is arguably the greatest AI participant on the town. The company is reportedly now in talks to finalize a $100 billion deal, valuing the company at more than $850 billion.  

Many staff have come and gone since the company first launched a decade in the past, and some have launched startups of their very own. Among these, some have turn into top rivals (like Anthropic), while others, just on investor curiosity alone, have managed to boost billions without even launching a product (see, Thinking Machine Labs).  

In January, Aliisa Rosenthal, OpenAI’s first sales chief, spoke somewhat bit about this rising network. She, like the other OpenAI alums who didn’t turn into founders, determined to turn into an investor and said she was going to faucet into the ex-OpenAI founder network to search for deal circulation. We know Peter Deng, OpenAI’s former head of shopper merchandise (and now normal associate at Felicis) already has.  

Below is a roundup of the major startups founded by OpenAI alumni, in alphabetical order. And we’re sure this checklist will develop over time. 

David Luan — Adept AI Labs 

David Luan was OpenAI’s engineering VP until he left in 2020. After a stint at Google, in 2021 he co-founded Adept AI Labs, a startup that builds AI instruments for workers. The startup last raised $350 million at a valuation north of $1 billion in 2023, however Luan left in late 2024 to supervise Amazon’s AI brokers lab after Amazon employed Adept’s founders.

Dario Amodei, Daniela Amodei, and John Schulman — Anthropic

Siblings Dario and Daniela Amodei left OpenAI in 2021 to type their very own startup, San Francisco-based Anthropic, that has lengthy touted a give attention to AI security. OpenAI co-founder John Schulman joined Anthropic in 2024, pledging to build a “safe AGI.” The company has since turn into OpenAI’s greatest rival and just raised a $30 billion Series G, nabbing a $380 billion valuation in the course of. IPO rumors are also swirling, as the company reportedly prepares for a public itemizing that may come someday this 12 months. (OpenAI is also allegedly getting ready for an IPO this 12 months and is possibly even making an attempt to beat Anthropic to the public market.) 

Rhythm Garg, Linden Li, and Yash Patil — Applied Compute  

Three ex-OpenAI staffers (Rhythm Garg, Linden Li, and Yash Patil) have reportedly raised $20 million for a startup called Applied Compute, as reported by Upstart Media. All three of them labored as technical workers at OpenAI for more than a 12 months before leaving last May to launch the startup, per their LinkedIns. The startup helps enterprises practice and deploy customized AI brokers. Benchmark led the round, valuing the 10-month-old company at $100 million, Upstart Media reported. 

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Pieter Abbeel, Peter Chen, and Rocky Duan — Covariant

The trio all labored at OpenAI in 2016 and 2017 as research scientists before founding Covariant, a Berkeley, California-based startup that builds basis AI fashions for robots. In 2024, Amazon employed all three of the Covariant founders and about 1 / 4 of its workers. The quasi-acquisition was seen by some as a part of a broader pattern of Big Tech making an attempt to keep away from antitrust scrutiny. 

Tim Shi — Cresta 

Tim Shi was an early member of OpenAI’s team, the place he targeted on constructing secure synthetic normal intelligence (AGI), according to his LinkedIn profile. He labored at OpenAI for a 12 months in 2017 however left to discovered Cresta, a San Francisco-based AI contact heart startup that has raised over $270 million from VCs like Sequoia Capital, Andreessen Horowitz, and others, according to a press release.

Jonas Schneider — Daedalus

Jonas Schneider led OpenAI’s software engineering for robotics team however left in 2019 to co-found Daedalus, which builds superior factories for precision elements. The San Francisco-based startup raised a $21 million Series A last 12 months with backing from Khosla Ventures, among others.

Andrej Karpathy — Eureka Labs

Computer imaginative and prescient professional Andrej Karpathy was a founding member and research scientist at OpenAI, leaving the startup to hitch Tesla in 2017 to guide its autopilot program. Karpathy is also well-known for his YouTube movies explaining core AI ideas. He left Tesla in 2024 to discovered his personal training technology startup, Eureka Labs, a San Francisco-based startup that is constructing AI instructing assistants.

Margaret Jennings — Kindo

Margaret Jennings labored at OpenAI in 2022 and 2023 until she left to co-found Kindo, which markets itself as an AI chatbot for enterprises. Kindo has raised over $27 million in funding, last elevating a $20.6 million Series A in 2024. Jennings left Kindo in 2024 to move product and research at French AI startup Mistral, according to her LinkedIn profile.

Maddie Hall — Living Carbon

Maddie Hall labored on “special projects” at OpenAI however left in 2019 to co-found Living Carbon, a San Francisco-based startup that goals to create engineered crops that can suck more carbon out of the sky to fight climate change. Living Carbon raised a $21 million Series A round in 2023, bringing its whole funding until then to $36 million, according to a press release.

Liam Fedus — Periodic Labs  

Liam Fedus, OpenAI’s VP of post-training research, left the company in March 2025 to team up together with his former Google Brain colleague, Ekin Dogus Cubuk, and launch Periodic Labs. The startup seeks to make use of AI scientists to search out new supplies, notably new superconducting supplies. It got here out of stealth mode in September 2025,(*18*) armed with an enormous $300 million in seed-round funding with backers that included Jezz Bezos, Eric Schmidt, Felicis and Andreessen Horowitz. 

Aravind Srinivas — Perplexity

Aravind Srinivas labored as a research scientist at OpenAI for a 12 months until 2022, when he left the company to co-found AI search engine Perplexity. His startup has attracted a string of high-profile traders like Jeff Bezos and Nvidia, although it’s also prompted controversy over alleged unethical internet scraping. Perplexity, which is based in San Francisco, last reported a elevate of $200 million at a $20 billion valuation. 

Jeff Arnold — Pilot

Jeff Arnold labored as OpenAI’s head of operations for 5 months in 2016 before co-founding San Francisco-based accounting startup Pilot in 2017. Pilot, which targeted initially on doing accounting for startups, last raised a $100 million Series C in 2021 at a $1.2 billion valuation and has attracted traders like Jeff Bezos. Arnold labored as Pilot’s COO until leaving in 2024 to launch a VC fund.

Shariq Hashme — Prosper Robotics

Shariq Hashme labored for OpenAI for 9 months in 2017 on a bot that may play the well-liked video game Dota, per his LinkedIn profile. After a few years at data-labeling startup Scale AI, he co-founded London-based Prosper Robotics in 2021. The startup says it’s engaged on a robotic butler for people’s properties, a sizzling pattern in robotics that other gamers like Norway’s 1X and Texas-based Apptronik are also engaged on.

Ilya Sutskever — Safe Superintelligence 

OpenAI co-founder and chief scientist Ilya Sutskever left OpenAI in May 2024 after he was reportedly a part of a failed effort to exchange CEO Sam Altman. Shortly afterward, he co-founded Safe Superintelligence, or SSI, with “one goal and one product: a safe superintelligence,” he says. Details about what precisely the startup is as much as are scant: It has no product and no income yet. But traders are clamoring for a bit anyway, and it’s been in a position to elevate $2 billion, with its latest valuation reportedly rising to $32 billion this month. SSI is based in Palo Alto, California, and Tel Aviv, Israel.

Emmett Shear — Stem AI

Emmett Shear is the former CEO of Twitch who was OpenAI’s interim CEO in November 2023 for a few days before Sam Altman rejoined the company. Shear launched an AI company, StemAI, in 2024 (though it appears to have since rebranded as Softmax). The company, which seems to be a research company, has attracted funding from Andreessen Horowitz.

Mira Murati — Thinking Machines Lab 

Mira Murati, OpenAI’s CTO, left OpenAI to discovered her personal company, Thinking Machines Lab, which emerged from stealth in February 2025. It said at the time (somewhat vaguely) that it is going to build AI that’s more “customizable” and “capable.” The San Francisco AI startup, now valued at $12 billion, announced its first product late last 12 months: an API that fine-tunes language fashions. It not too long ago made headlines when two of its co-founders announced earlier this 12 months that they would return to OpenAI. 

Kyle Kosic — xAI

Kyle Kosic left OpenAI in 2023 to turn into a co-founder and infrastructure lead of xAI, Elon Musk’s AI startup that provides a rival chatbot, Grok. In 2024, however, he hopped again to OpenAI, the place he stays. Meanwhile, xAI (which acquired Musk’s social media web site X) was bought by Musk’s SpaceX, giving the coalesce company a valuation of $1.25 trillion. It is seeking to go public someday in June for what could possibly be a historic itemizing. 

Angela Jiang — Worktrace AI

Angela Jiang left OpenAI in 2024, after working as a product supervisor and on the public coverage team. In April 2025, she quietly launched Worktrace, which makes use of AI to assist enterprises make enterprise operations more environment friendly. It observes worker work patterns and automates workflow, according to the company’s web site. The enterprise is backed by Mura Murati, OpenAI’s former CTO, who went on to launch Thinking Labs. It is also backed by OpenAI’s startup fund, along with a slew of other OpenAI names, like its chief strategy officer, Jason Kwon. 

Stealth Startups

In addition to these startups, a lot of other former OpenAI staff have founded startups that are still in stealth mode, according to numerous updates TechCrunch discovered on LinkedIn. For occasion, it appears that former OpenAI researcher Danilo Hellermark has been engaged on a generative AI stealth startup for the past few years. He formally left OpenAI at the starting of 2023. There’s also one apparently in the works from Lucas Negritto, who labored on OpenAI’s technical team and left the company in 2023 after three years. Since then, he’s founded one startup and has been engaged on another since August 2025, according to his LinkedIn. 

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