This Week’s Top Talent Pools

Lila Sciences, a Cambridge-based developer of autonomous scientific labs, is in talks to raise $2B at an $8.5B pre-money valuation, led by CalPERS and NVentures. Named Fast Company Top 10 Most Innovative AI Company 2026.

  1. Jacob Feala in Boston (Stealth)

    1. Role: Co-Founder @ Lila Sciences (3 yrs)

    2. Other Experience: Computational Biology @ Generate Biomedicines, Personalized Cancer Vaccines Bioinformatics @ Moderna, UCSD PhD Bioengineering

    3. Description: Startup creation @ Flagship Pioneering since 1/26

  2. Jaclyn Lunger in SF (Co-Founder & CTO @ Panorama)

    1. Role: 1st Employee & ML Scientist @ Lila Sciences (1.5 yrs)

    2. Other Experience: Member @ South Park Commons, DOE Fellow @ SLAC, MIT PhD Materials Science, Cornell BS Materials Science Eng

    3. Description: “Panorama transforms plain English into powerful workflows and effortless automations. Just describe what you need. It works across your stack, acts inside your favorite tools, and does everything you can do.”

    4. Contact: [email protected]

  3. Jake Yasonik in US (Potential Founder)

    1. Role: ML Engineer II @ Lila Sciences (1 yr)

    2. Other Experience: Venture @ Redpoint, ML Engineer & Founding Team @ Osmo ($135M from Lux, GV, Two Sigma), ML @ D.E. Shaw Research, Research @ Google Brain, MIT SB CS + Molecular Biology

    3. Description: Left Redpoint 6/26

    4. Contact: Site, [email protected]

  4. Andy Xu in NYC (Stealth)

    1. Role: ML Research @ Lila Sciences (<1 yr)

    2. Other Experience: Neo Scholar Finalist, 1st Technical Hire @ Iudex AI (acq by xAI)

    3. Description: "Simulating human behavior at scale"

    4. Contact: Site, Twitter, [email protected]

Generalist AI, a robotics startup building general intelligence for the physical world, raised $400M at a $2B valuation. Radical Ventures led, joined by 8VC, Union Square Ventures, Norwest, Hanabi Capital, and existing investors Nvidia and Bezos Expeditions.

  1. Gleb Polyakov in SF (Potential Founder)

    1. Role: COO @ Generalist AI (<1 yr)

    2. Other Experience: Co-Founder & CEO @ Nylas ($175M from Tiger Global, 8VC, Spark Capital), Founder & CEO @ ZPM Espresso (acq), Georgia Tech BS Physics

    3. Description: Left Generalist AI 2/26

Reactor, a San Francisco developer platform for real-time generative video, emerged from stealth with $59M in funding led by Lightspeed.

  1. Alex Yu in SF (Potential Founder)

    1. Role: Founder @ Luma AI ($1B+ raised from a16z, Amplify, Matrix; Reactor Founder’s previous startup)

    2. Other Experience: Research @ UC Berkeley (Plenoxels, pixelNeRF), Research Intern @ Adobe, SWE Intern @ Google

    3. Description: Left Luma AI in 2024

    4. Contact: Site

Liftoff Mobile (Nasdaq: LFTO), an AI-powered mobile advertising and monetization platform, IPO'd on Nasdaq on 6/4/26, raising $437M at $23/share ($4.18B market cap). Founded 2012. Backed by Blackstone and General Atlantic. FY2025 revenue: $686M (32% YoY growth).

  1. Mark Ellis in Atlanta (Co-Founder & CEO @ CapsulateBio)

    1. Role: Co-Founder & CEO @ Liftoff (10 yrs)

    2. Other Experience: VP Corp & Biz Dev @ Ooyala, Strategy & Biz Ops @ Google, Special Assistant @ US DoD, HBS MBA, Cambridge MPhil

    3. Description: Stealth since 1/25

  2. JJ Maxwell in SF (CEO @ Pillar)

    1. Role: CTO @ Liftoff Influence (1.5 yrs)

    2. Other Experience: CEO @ Double ($3.9M seed), Co-Founder @ Jetfuel (acq by Vungle/Liftoff), Co-Founder @ Real Labs, Data Scientist @ Facebook, Data Scientist @ Remind, U Waterloo Eng

    3. Description: "Connect your tools. Pillar adds the reasoning engine, knowledge pipeline, and dashboard — then deploys to Slack, your app, Discord, MCP, and whatever's next. Open source.”

    4. Funding: Backed by YC & Matrix

Opal Security, an SF-based identity security and access management startup, raised $23M. Greylock and Battery Ventures led, joined by Cambium Capital.

  1. Josh Chen in NYC (Stealth)

    1. Role: CPO & Head of Platform Eng @ Opal (1.5 yrs)

    2. Other Experience: Co-Founder @ Basis ($133M from a16z, Lightspeed, Bain Capital, GV, Druckenmiller), ML Engineer @ Merantix, Quant Strategies @ D.E. Shaw, Princeton BS CS

    3. Description: "AI agent and productivity tool"

    4. Contact: GitHub

  2. Naseem Al-Naji in SF (Co-Founder @ MCPcat)

    1. Role: Co-Founder & CEO @ Opal (3 yrs)

    2. Other Experience: Co-Founder @ Pearl, Eng Manager @ Expanse, SWE @ MuleSoft, UC Berkeley BS EECS

    3. Description: "User analytics and live debugging for MCPs"

Lassie, a six-year-old San Francisco startup that develops AI software to automate administrative work for dental practices, raised a $35 million Series A round at an approximately $250 million post-money valuation. The deal was led by Andreessen Horowitz, with Night Capital, Gokul Rajaram, and Dr. Edward Zuckerberg also participating. Upstarts has more here.

  1. Jeffrey Tang in SF (Potential Founder)

    1. Role: Founding Engineer @ Lassie (3 yrs)

    2. Other Experience: AI Product Engineer @ Brain Co, SWE @ Ramp, Quant Trader @ IMC Trading, SWE @ Citadel Securities, SWE @ Citadel

    3. Description: Left Brain Co. 3/26

    4. Contact: Site, [email protected]

Forage, an SF-based fintech helping low-income families use EBT/SNAP payments online ("Stripe for EBT"), raised $40M in Series B. Mouro Capital led, joined by Nyca Partners, PayPal Ventures, Long Journey Ventures, Intuit Ventures, Pivotal Ventures, and FJ Labs.

  1. Justin I. in LA (Stealth)

    1. Role: CEO & Founder @ Forage (3 yrs)

    2. Other Experience: Co-Founder @ Sikhana, CoS @ Newsela

    3. Description: "Back Building"

  2. Jake Goldman in US (Stealth)

    1. Role: Founding Team @ Forage (1 yr)

    2. Other Experience: Co-Founder & CEO @ Kairo Health (YC), Founding Team @ Ophelia (Tiger Global, Menlo, General Catalyst), SWE @ Bridgewater, SWE @ Axonius

    3. Description: "Building the future of law"

    4. Funding: Backed by YC

  3. Ajay Vasisht in NYC (Stealth)

    1. Role: Founding Team @ Forage (1 yr)

    2. Other Experience: GM @ Alchemy, ML Engineer @ Anduril, PM @ DocuSign, Investment Engineer @ Bridgewater, Penn MSE CS

    3. Description: "Building the future of law"

    4. Funding: Backed by YC

  4. Robert Gormisky in NYC (Stealth)

    1. Role: 1st FTE & Founding Engineer @ Forage (5 yrs)

    2. Other Experience: Quant PM @ AIG, Quant Analyst @ Lincoln Financial, Wharton BS Finance + Statistics, UT Austin MS CS

    3. Description: Stealth since 4/26

Impulse Space, an LA-based developer of highly-maneuverable spacecraft, raised $500M in Series D. 137 Ventures and Banner VC led, joined by Founders Fund, Lux Capital, and Linse Capital.

  1. Barry Matsumori in LA (Stealth)

    1. Role: COO @ Impulse Space (1.5 yrs)

    2. Other Experience: President & COO @ Skydweller Aero, SVP Sales & BD @ SpaceX, SVP @ Virgin Galactic

    3. Description: Stealth Space Tech since 4/25

    4. Contact: [email protected]

  2. Jack Oswald in LA (Stealth)

    1. Role: 1st Technical Hire @ Impulse Space (<1 yr)

    2. Other Experience: Combustion Devices @ SpaceX, Vehicle Architecture @ Tesla, MIT BS Aerospace Eng, Stanford MS Aerospace Eng

    3. Description: Stealth Defense Tech since 6/23

DriveNets, an Israeli networking software startup, raised $410M at an $8.5B valuation. Bessemer and Atreides Management led, joined by Pitango, D1 Capital Partners, AMD, and Red Dot Capital Partners.

  1. Yuval Lev in Israel (Stealth)

    1. Role: 1st SWE & Team Leader @ DriveNets (5.5 yrs)

    2. Other Experience: Co-Founder & CEO @ Senser (acq by DriveNets), Co-Founder @ PiTo, Project Manager @ IDF Unit Matzov

    3. Description: Stealth since 1/26

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