Quild #12: Merge

This is the Quild daily, highlighting one early-stage startup that has statistically significant signals of becoming a unicorn.

Merge integrates HR, payroll, recruiting, and accounting platforms into a unified API. Its drop-in component makes adding integration authorization to a product a walk in the park. It also enables logs, issue detection, and automated alerts to save customer success team time, money, and headaches.

Founders: Gil Feig, Shensi Ding

Signals:

1. Venture-backed company experience

   1. Shensi was the chief of staff at Expanse for 2 years until it was acquired by Palo Alto Networks for $800M in 2020. Expanse was funded by Founders Fund, NEA, IVP, and TPG

   2. Gil was the head of engineering at Canvas for 2 years until he started Merge in 2020. Canvas was funded by Sequoia and Owl Ventures

2. Top company alumni

   1. Shensi worked at Credit Suisse and Silver Lake for ~3 years before joining Expanse

   2. Gil worked at LinkedIn and Wealthfront for ~3 years before joining Canvas

3. Top university graduates

   1. Gil graduated with BS Computer Science from Columbia University

   2. Shensi graduated with BS Computer Science from Columbia University

4. Fast team growth

   1. Grew from ~4x from 8 to 35 over the past year

   2. They’re still hiring a lot!

5. Accelerated funding

   1. Merge was founded in 2020, announced seed funding in May 2021, and series A funding in Nov 2021

6. Midas list investors

   1. Addition led series A

   2. NEA led seed

Till tomorrow, Kenn