Uber's first investors included StumbleUpon founder Garrett Camp

Uber's startup origin story starts in Paris

Back in 2009, Uber’s cofounders tried to catch a cab during a Paris snowstorm without much luck. If only they could have requested a ride through one of their phones. This article dives into how Uber went from idea, to reality, to successful startup.

7 prominent investors rejected Airbnb in its early days

Airbnb is arguably known as one of the most successful startup stories of all time. But back in 2008, many prominent investors rejected their pitch when they went out to raise money—and Airbnb's founder still has the rejection emails to prove it.

7 angel investors funded Google in its early days

Entrepreneur Shaan Puri shares how seven strangers acted as Google’s earliest angel investors. The first gave Google $100K without even putting his equity agreement in writing. The investors on “Shark Tank” use their personal funds to support startups, but they’re often more predatory about terms than typical angels.

Cyan Banister, once homeless, was an angel investor in Uber, SpaceX, and DeepMind

Cyan Banister has invested in more than 100 companies, building a reputation in the angel-investing world for her unorthodox approach.

Andreessen Horowitz is among the most well-known venture capital firms

Also known as a16z, the firm has invested in companies such as Airbnb, Facebook, and Lyft since its founding in 2009. A podcast episode offers a deep dive into how the firm got started and became the industry disruptor it is today.

YC was partly inspired by an investor named Julian Weber

Y Combinator Cofounder Paul Graham’s former professor’s husband Julian Weber provided $10K in seed funding to Graham’s previous startup, Viaweb in its early days. In exchange, Weber received 10% of the company. Weber’s involvement inspired Graham to start a program where investors were more involved with the companies they contributed seed funding to.

More than $3.5B has been invested through AngelList

AngelList was created to connect startups and angel investors. It’s evolved since its 2010 founding and has been used by companies like Uber and OpenSea.

The dot-com boom made Mark Cuban a billionaire

Cuban co-founded AudioNet with Todd Wagner in 1995 before it became Broadcast.com—a web app that allowed people to listen to sports commentary on their computers if they couldn't watch a game. In 1999, Yahoo bought Broadcast.com for $5.7B. By the time the market crashed, Cuban had already sold most of his stock in the company and had become a billionaire.

Venture capital is a type of financing that firms and funds use to invest in startups they believe have the potential for long-term growth

Household name companies such as Airbnb and Uber might not exist without venture capital, which is commonly referred to as "VC" for short.

Where are the first batch of YC founders now?

Reddit was one of the companies in Y Combinator’s first batch. While OpenAI wasn’t among the companies started at YC, Sam Altman, who would later become the AI company’s CEO, had a different company called Loopt in the first batch.

Venture capital is a form of funding provided to early-stage companies with high growth potential, typically in exchange for an equity (or ownership) stake

More than 400 investors turned Peloton down in its initial funding rounds

Peloton founder John Foley said investors rejected the company's initial funding requests because there was no clear indication of what the market for at-home fitness classes looked like. Ultimately, more than 200 angel investors gave the company its first round of cash. (Some users may experience a paywall.)

One Facebook investor turned $500K into $1B

Peter Thiel was Facebook's first big investor. In 2004, he invested $500K into the social network, long before the company owned Instagram or renamed itself "Meta." In 2012, when he sold off most of his stake, he turned that initial $500K investment into more than $1B in cash.

Sam Altman gave his first-ever startup pitch after dropping out of Stanford

He dropped out of Stanford to start Loopt, which sold in 2012 for $43.4M. You can watch his first-ever startup pitch in a video.

Explore Bessemer's anti-portfolio of missed opportunities

From Pinterest to Yelp, Bessemer Venture Partners—one of the most well-known VC firms—has invested in many successful companies over the years. But the firm has also kicked itself for passing on a few great opportunities, like Apple and Google. Check out the other companies in Bessemer's "anti-portfolio" here.

Explore the 2025 Uber lost & found index

A chainsaw. Ten live lobsters. A mannequin head with human hair. These are just a few curious items passengers left behind in Ubers this year, according to Uber itself. Uber is among the largest gig economy platforms in the US, with a valuation of roughly $150B as of 2024.

Facebook settled a lawsuit over Zuckerberg allegedly stealing the original idea for the company for $65M

While at Harvard, three students (Cameron Winklevoss, Tyler Winklevoss, and Divya Narendra) approached Mark Zuckerberg with the idea for a platform exclusively for Harvard students called ConnectU. Those students sued Facebook, alleging that Zuckerberg stole the idea from the trio.

Prediction market Polymarket's CEO dropped out of New York University

Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan started building Polymarket when he was 21. Polymarket has been backed by billionaire investors such as Peter Thiel and Vitalik Buterin.

The 25 biggest IPOs in US history

These 25 companies—which include UPS, Uber Technologies, AT&T, and The Kraft Heinz Co.—had some of the biggest IPO drops in US history. However, not all these drops led to long-term (or even immediate) success.

Elon Musk once tried to make himself CEO of OpenAI

After three years of funding the company since its 2015 launch, Musk believed OpenAI had fallen too far behind Google and proposed taking the helm. Rejected by OpenAI's other founders, Musk walked away and reneged on a $1B donation. (Some users may experience a paywall.)

Read about Palantir's early days—from a Stanford University dorm to an investment from the CIA

Palantir was originally founded after the 9/11 attacks as a private-sector solution to the government's growing need for advanced intelligence. One of its earliest investors was In-Q-Tel, the CIA's non-profit venture capital firm.

WellHub is a startup serving roughly 4 million people in 11 countries, providing broad wellness benefits to employees

Valued at $2.4B in 2025, the company helps workers get gym access and meditation apps, in addition to basic healthcare. Listen to the founder of the company, Cesar Cevalho, explain how he scaled the company with Jeff Berman.

The woman who coined the term ‘girlboss’ now has a VC firm called Trust Fund

In 2006, Amoruso founded the clothing company Nasty Gal, then later wrote a memoir called “#Girlboss” about her company’s meteoric rise. Later, she launched other ventures, including her “Business Class” business coaching series and the venture capital fund “Trust Fund.”

California startup Rivian has attracted disillusioned Tesla owners

Some electric vehicle buyers frustrated by Elon Musk's antics have been won over by the adventure-focused company, which has received a $5B investment from the Volkswagen Group to develop crossover and hatchback models with solid-state batteries.

Bumble's ill-received 2024 rebrand included ads encouraging users to stop being celibate

The ads were meant to promote a new option on the dating app that allowed men to message first in opposite-sex matches—a significant change to the app's signature "women make the first move" feature. Bumble later apologized for the ads on Instagram. Bumble shares fell 54% after the brand removed the signature feature and allowed men to message first.

Groupon was a digital coupon platform popular in the 2010s

Remember when everyone you knew seemed to have a Groupon for something? In August 2010, Forbes called the digital coupon platform the “fastest growing company ever.” However, the business model had some flaws: One analysis found that only an estimated 20% of Groupon buyers returned for full-price purchases.

SpaceX's S-1 or 'prospectus' revealed many previously unknown details about the company, including its unprofitability despite doing $18.7B in revenue in 2025, exactly how many voting shares Elon Musk will have in the company (roughly 85%), and more.

The name 'Silicon Valley' arose from the founding of Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory in Fairchild Semiconductor in 1956-57, founded near Stanford University in Palo Alto

Children are now three times more likely to say they want to be a YouTuber when they grow up than an astronaut, with some even attending 'YouTube camps' that teach kids how to create content for the platform.

In 2025, four executives from large tech companies were given positions in the US Army Reserves—including Palantir Chief Technology Officer Shyam Sankar, which reinforced Palantir's ties with the US military and its role as a leading defense partner.

While the first exchange-traded fund (a 'basket' of different assets that can be bought and sold on a stock exchange) in the US only launched in 1993, the global ETF market has grown to more than $10T in the short time since.

Fast-casual restaurant Chili's is experiencing a resurgence, with its parent company recently reporting a nearly 32% increase in sales, thanks to passionate Gen Z fans on TikTok.

Warren Buffett's former professor Benjamin Graham is known as the 'father of value investing,' a strategy in which investors seek to buy stocks trading below their intrinsic worth.

Budweiser stores yeast derived from the original 1800s strain in a secret bunker, which only the Head of Yeast Management can access—not even the CEO

A Yale student wrote a profound essay about the consulting industry's influence on elite college students that was published in a book of her writing after she died in a post-graduation car accident.

How Amazon operates a 'flywheel' business model, a self-reinforcing cycle that drives continuous growth

Domino's Pizza's 30-minute delivery guarantee was responsible for the chain's 1980s surge, but it was discontinued after the company was found liable for delivery driver accidents.

A 2019 Facebook event called on attendees to "Storm Area 51, They Can't Stop All of Us," resulting in countless memes, the creation of a music festival, and eventually the arrests of those who did try to approach the area.

The Dracula character, now seen as the vampire archetype, was inspired by a seafood-induced nightmare its creator experienced.

Up to a million Girl Scouts sell about 200 million cookie boxes every spring, generating $800 million, largely because refusing a child is frowned upon

NBA superstar Victor Wembanyama spent the 2025 summer training with monks in central China to enhance his body and mind.

The Beatles' US label rejected the band's first two singles, 'Please Please Me' and 'From Me to You,' with one executive calling the band 'dead in the water.'

Memecoins are a type of cryptocurrency—a form of digital currency with a wide variety of uses—created around popular 'memes,' or viral internet jokes.

The price of gas is a composite made up of several different factors, with the federal gas tax making up less than 20% of what drivers pay at the pump.

Most of the observable universe's volume consists of voids and supervoids—enormous regions of space with little to no galaxies, stars, or light.

Ebola species have historically been named after where they were discovered, stigmatizing residents who live there, including Bundibugyo, in Uganda.

Watch a 1934 short film starring jazz legend Cab Calloway, a major figure in the Harlem Renaissance's music scene

US intelligence allegedly pursued more than 600 schemes to assassinate Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro.

Mark Twain spent decades feuding with the US Postal Service, convinced its costs and regulations were bureaucratic overreach.

Lesser-known phobias include turophobia, or the fear of cheese, and nomophobia, the fear of being without your cell phone.