# David Yaffe

> David Yaffe is the New York-based co-founder and CEO of Estuary, a managed data integration company combining streaming and batch workloads. A mechanical engineering graduate, he worked as an aeronautical engineer at Boeing, led product at Invite Media and DoubleClick Bid Manager, co-founded Arbor, and became LiveRamp’s COO following its 2016 acquisition of Arbor. His public writing examines data access, software infrastructure, and the pitfalls of managing through metrics.

- **Role:** Co-founder and CEO at Estuary
- **Organizations:** Estuary, Arbor, LiveRamp, Google, Invite Media, Boeing, Narrative, Optable
- **Education:** B.S. in Mechanical Engineering, Binghamton University, M.S. in Mechanical Engineering, Columbia University
- **Known for:** Co-founded Arbor, which was acquired by LiveRamp in 2016., Served as COO of LiveRamp., Led product for Invite Media and DoubleClick Bid Manager.

## Career timeline

- **2005** — Completed a B.S. in mechanical engineering at Binghamton University.
- **2006** — Completed an M.S. in mechanical engineering at Columbia University; worked as an aeronautical engineer at Boeing before entering data and advertising technology.
- **2008** — Joined Invite Media; subsequently led product for Invite Media and Google’s DoubleClick Bid Manager.
- **2014** — Co-founded Arbor and served as CEO.
- **2016** — Arbor was acquired by LiveRamp; Yaffe subsequently served as general manager and COO.
- **2019** — Co-founded Estuary with Johnny Graettinger; Narrative announced his appointment to its board in June.
- **2021** — Participated as an angel investor in Optable’s seed financing.
- **2025** — Estuary announced a $17 million Series A on October 21, led by M13 with FirstMark and Operator Partners participating.

## Achievements

- Co-founded Arbor, which was acquired by LiveRamp in 2016.
- Served as COO of LiveRamp.
- Led product for Invite Media and DoubleClick Bid Manager.
- Co-founded Estuary with Johnny Graettinger, building on earlier work on Gazette.
- Estuary announced a $17 million Series A in October 2025.

## Latest updates

- **2026-08** — Appeared on Eventual Consistency on August 12 to discuss data orchestration consolidation, documentation for AI agents, and task-specific, time-limited permissions.
- **2026-06** — A BUILDERS episode published June 19 discussed Estuary’s enterprise sales qualification, pricing choices, and expansion from analytics use cases.
- **2025-10** — Co-announced Estuary’s $17 million Series A led by M13, with FirstMark and Operator Partners participating.

## Links

- Website: https://estuary.dev/author/dave/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidyaffe/

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/david-yaffe
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-10-25