Stealth Startup Spy #356
Ex-Gamma CEO builds treasury infra for instant payments, Former Meta/Amazon engineer and YC alum enters stealth, & Ex-LinkedIn engineering lead builds a 3.7B-transaction database for fintechs
🚀 We just launched a new newsletter — Company Launch Tracker.
We’re tracking company launches as they happen and surfacing the most interesting new founders and startups (yes, all outside of this stealth activity too). If you want to stay ahead of the curve, this is where you’ll find them first.
Right now we’ve got 5 subscribers: my wife, my mom, and that high school buddy who won’t stop pitching me his app. Be smart like them and get in early 👇
We run a live feed inside Gravity that tracks founders entering stealth and companies quietly exiting it.
What you’re reading here is about 1% of the stealth activity we pick up. The full tracker updates in real time as things change and new activity emerges.
If you want earlier access to everything, book some time with us to stay ahead.
In this issue of the Stealth Startup Spy, here is what we will uncover:
Ex-Founder & CEO of Gamma (acquired by Palo Alto Networks) is now building programmable treasury infrastructure for instant receivables, payables, and settlements
The founder who sold Civil Maps to Luminar has entered stealth
After exiting Dishpatch to Waitrose, this founder is now developing task-specific robots that automate CNC machine tending for manufacturers
A Meta and Amazon engineer, also a YC-backed co-founder, has gone stealth
Formerly Engineering Lead at LinkedIn and CEO of Exeq (acquired) launches a queryable database spanning 3.7 billion monthly consumer transactions for funds and fintechs
And more…
Now let’s shine the spotlight… 💡💡💡
🕵️♂️Founders Coming Out of Stealth
Real-time updates from founders who debut what they’ve been working on under stealth mode
Arpit Goel - Founder, CEO at Root
🔎 Featured Founder under stealth mode 30 weeks ago
FounderDNA: Serial Founder, Technical Founder, Doctorate Degree, Masters Degree, Top 10 University, Prior Exit
Prior Experience: Founder & CEO at Gamma (acquired by Palo Alto Networks, 2021), VP of Product - Next-Gen CASB at Palo Alto Networks, PhD & MS at Stanford University, Lead Data Scientist at Target
Root is an instant money movement platform that enables marketplaces and platforms to connect directly with their bank accounts to configure and initiate API-based payouts and money movement workflows.
HQ: San Francisco, California, United States
Industry: Fintech, Payments Infrastructure | Team Size: 25
Time Spent in Stealth Mode: 10 Months
Peter Butler - CEO & Co-Founder at Whistle Robotics
FounderDNA: Serial Founder, Prior Exit
Prior Experience: Founder & CEO at Dishpatch (acquired by Waitrose & Partners, 2024), Associate at The Boston Consulting Group, Financial Analyst at Houlihan Lokey
Connect on: LinkedIn
Whistle Robotics makes automation accessible to small and medium-sized manufacturers by building intelligent, task-specific robots that deploy quickly, starting with CNC machine tending.
HQ: London Area, United Kingdom
Industry: Robotics, Industrial Automation | Team Size: 2
Time Spent in Stealth Mode: 7 Months
Derek Brown - Founder & CEO at American Spend
FounderDNA: Serial Founder, Technical Founder, Prior Exit
Prior Experience: CEO at Exeq (acquired by Retail Worx, 2019), VP Product Development at Addepar, Engineering Lead at LinkedIn, Founder at Birthday Labs, CEO at Bunches
American Spend provides a complete, queryable record of American consumer spending — 3.7 billion transactions a month — giving funds and companies API or SDK access to verified consumer spending data and competitive-landscape insights at transaction-level resolution.
HQ: Nashville, Tennessee, United States
Industry: Fintech, Consumer Spending Data | Team Size: 4
Time Spent in Stealth Mode: 7 Months
Laky Li - Co-Founder & CEO at JoyWork
FounderDNA: Technical Founder
Prior Experience: Staff Product Manager - QuickBooks Invoice & Payments at Intuit, Data Science at Netlify
Co-Founder: Skylar Chen (Software Engineer at Amazon Web Services (AWS), Product Engineer at TikTok)
JoyWork helps field service and facilities companies get paid faster, running accounts receivable collection end-to-end with AI agents that prioritize accounts, handle outreach, and escalate to a human only when it counts.
HQ: San Francisco, California, United States
Industry: B2B SaaS, Accounts Receivable Automation | Team Size: 3
Time Spent in Stealth Mode: 6 Months
Jordan Zietz - Co-Founder at LemonLime
FounderDNA: Serial Founder, Top 10 University
Prior Experience: Management Science and Engineering at Stanford University, Co-Founder at Confetti (AI-native social platform), Associate Consultant Intern at Mastercard
Co-Founder: Daniela Munoz (SWE intern at Google and Microsoft)
LemonLime (YC S26) builds the knowledge layer that turns businesses into AI-native companies, applying retrieval-and-reasoning-optimized memory architecture with custom agents deployed on top for high-ROI workflows.
HQ: San Francisco, California, United States
Industry: Artificial Intelligence, Enterprise Software | Team Size: 4
Time Spent in Stealth Mode: 5 Months
🕵️♂️Key Talent Going Under Stealth
Illuminating clues left behind by world class talent and influential innovators who just went into stealth mode
Dimitrios Ilias - Founder at Stealth AI Startup
FounderDNA: Serial Founder, Technical Founder, Former FAANG
Prior Experience: Co-Founder at Intryc (YC S24), Software Engineer at Meta, Software Development Engineer at Amazon, Senior Engineer at Revolut, Quantitative Developer (AVP) at Deutsche Bank
Connect on: LinkedIn
HQ: San Francisco, California, United States
Time Spent in Stealth Mode: 1 Month
Sravan Puttagunta - Founder at Stealth AI Startup
FounderDNA: Serial Founder, Technical Founder, Top 10 University, Prior Exit
Prior Experience: CEO at Civil Maps (acquired by Luminar), Founder, CEO, and Chief of Technology & Research at Hyperspec.ai, Head of AI at Sage Care, Engineering at Reducto, Senior Engineer: Algorithm Developer (Pre-IPO) at Samba TV
Connect on: LinkedIn
HQ: San Francisco, California, United States
Time Spent in Stealth Mode: 4 Months
Tomasz Gorka - Founder at Stealth AI Startup
FounderDNA: Serial Founder, Technical Founder, Masters Degree, Former FAANG
Prior Experience: Software Engineer at Google, CTO / Co-Founder at CarMoov, Staff Software Engineer (Founding Engineer) at Flow, VP of Agentic AI at Endeavor AI
Connect on: LinkedIn
HQ: San Francisco, California, United States
Time Spent in Stealth Mode: 4 Months
Johnston Chu - Co-Founder at Stealth Startup
FounderDNA: Technical Founder, Masters Degree
Prior Experience: Director of Engineering at Snowflake, Software Design Engineer (Exchange) at Microsoft, Application Developer (Market Risk) at Goldman Sachs
Connect on: LinkedIn
HQ: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Time Spent in Stealth Mode: 6 Months
Zhixing Chen - Founder at Stealth
FounderDNA: Technical Founder, Masters Degree, Top 10 University
Prior Experience: MS (Music Technology) at MIT, Human-AI Interaction Researcher at MIT CSAIL, Swappable Battery Researcher at MIT Precision Engineering Research Group, Soft Robotics Intern at Bristol Robotics Laboratory
Connect on: LinkedIn
HQ: New York, United States
Time Spent in Stealth Mode: 1 Month
🚨Here’s the deal🚨This email has gotten too big. Exciting, but with more people following it, the edge diminishes. I’ve thought long and hard about what to do to preserve the value in the signals. I’m not sure about the final direction yet, but in the meantime I’ve been sending an email 48 hours earlier to a select group of paid subscribers. The feedback has been pretty positive so I’m going to open up the list for another 100 spots. To get signals early, Apply here!
Stay Stealthy,
Drake
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Stealth Startup Spy is a data-driven newsletter for investors, journalists and tech enthusiasts interested in uncovering the next big move for key talent, real-time stealth company launches and technology advancements not in plain sight. We leverage the technology built at Gravity to shine a light on the hidden world of stealth startups.