I founded StartupBake to help the world's best startups build top 1% teams. It started as a side project and eventually scaled to $400K+ in revenue. Worked closely with founders of Seed to Series B startups (backed by YC, Greylock, Village Global, Google, 776, Kleiner Perkins, and more).
StartupBake evolved from a side project to a full-time business over the course of 1.5 years. It initially started as a marketplace to connect design advisors with startups—check out my series on building the initial version in public here.
We built up a curated talent network of 3,000+ startup-leaning talent and ran a recruiting service to connect them with the best startups hiring, often in < 30 days. I worked closely with Seed to Series B founders backed by YC, Greylock, Village Global, Google, 776, Kleiner Perkins, and more to help them with hiring. We hired across functions (eng, design, growth) and did both IC as well as exec searches.
I had a great time building this and going deep in recruiting, but realized that I wanted to lean into the product side of things vs scaling a service business. This lead to me tinkering with AI-powered recruiting products and doubling down on my journey as a design engineer.
I decided to pause it in July 2025 in order to go all-in on coding and building products. This lead to launching Crossword Chef, Eternal, Chessray, and more coming soon.