One title is popping up loads throughout tech startup social media proper now, and also you may’ve heard it: Soham Parekh. On X, persons are joking that Parekh is single-handedly holding up all fashionable digital infrastructure, whereas others are posting memes about him working in entrance of a dozen totally different screens or filling in for the thousands of those who Microsoft simply laid off.
From what social media posts recommend, Parekh is definitely a software program engineer who appears to have interviewed at dozens of tech startups through the years, whereas additionally juggling a number of jobs on the identical time. A number of startups had this revelation on July 2nd, when Suhail Doshi, founding father of the AI design software Playground, posted a PSA on X, saying:
PSA: there’s a man named Soham Parekh (in India) who works at 3-4 startups on the identical time. He’s been preying on YC corporations and extra. Beware.
I fired this man in his first week and informed him to cease mendacity / scamming folks. He hasn’t stopped a 12 months later. No extra excuses.
Doshi’s put up was shortly flooded with replies that included comparable tales. “We interviewed this man too, however caught this throughout references checks,” Variant founder Ben South said. “Seems he had 5-6 profiles every with 5+ locations he truly labored at.” When requested what tipped him off about Parekh, South informed The Verge that his suspicions arose throughout Parekh’s interview, prompting his workforce to do a reference verify sooner than they normally would. “That’s after we realized he was working a number of jobs,” South stated.
Parekh’s resume and pitch email look good at first look, which helps him garner curiosity from a number of corporations. “He had a prolific GitHub contribution graph and prior startup expertise,” Marcus Lowe, founder of the AI app builder Create, informed The Verge. “He was additionally extraordinarily technically robust throughout our interview course of.”
Simply in the future after this all unfolded, Parekh got here ahead in an interview with the daily tech show TBPN. Parekh confirmed what many tech startup founders had suspected: he had been working for a number of corporations on the identical time. “I’m not pleased with what I’ve achieved. That’s not one thing I endorse both. However nobody actually likes to work 140 hours every week, I needed to do it out of necessity,” Parekh stated. “I used to be in extraordinarily dire monetary circumstances.”
Parekh appears to have made a great first impression on many individuals. Digger CEO Igor Zalutski said his firm “practically employed him,” as he “appeared so sharp” throughout interviews, whereas AIVideo.com cofounder Justin Harvey similarly stated that he was “THIS near hiring him,” including that “he truly crushed the interview.” Vapi cofounder Jordan Dearsley said Parekh “was the perfect technical interview” he’s seen, however he “didn’t ship on his tasks.”
The startups that did rent Parekh didn’t seem to keep him around for lengthy. Lowe stated that he observed one thing was off when Parekh saved making excuses to push again his begin date. After telling Lowe that he needed to delay working as a result of he had a visit deliberate to see his sister in New York, Parekh later claimed that he couldn’t begin working following the journey as a result of he was sick. “For no matter purpose, one thing simply felt off,” Lowe stated.
That’s when Lowe visited Parekh’s GitHub profile and realized he was committing code to a non-public repository throughout the time he was speculated to be sick. Lowe additionally discovered latest commits to a different San Francisco-based startup. “Did some digging, observed that he was in a few of their advertising supplies,” Lowe stated. “I used to be like, ‘Huh, however he didn’t declare this on his resume. This feels bizarre.’” Create ended up letting Parekh go after he failed to finish an task.
It seems to be like Parekh even had a stint at Meta. In 2021, the company published a post highlighting his story as a contributor engaged on mixed-reality experiences in WebXR. Within the put up, Parekh stated that he discovered “that one of the simplest ways to get higher at software program improvement is to not solely apply it however to make use of it to resolve actual world issues.” Meta didn’t instantly reply to The Verge’s request for remark.
Parekh’s purported scheme could have been uncovered, however his outlook won’t be all dangerous — for those who consider him. Parekh claims he landed a job at Darwin, an AI video remixing startup. “Earlier at present, I signed an unique founding deal to be founding engineer at one firm and one firm solely,” Parekh posted on X. “They have been the one ones keen to wager on me presently.”