# Jorge Torres

> Jorge Torres is the Co-Founder and CEO of MindsDB, an open-source AI data platform headquartered in Berkeley, California. He is a Visiting Research Scholar at UC Berkeley focused on machine learning automation and explainability. Torres built MindsDB to democratize AI—letting any developer query AI models directly from databases using plain SQL or natural language. Under his leadership, MindsDB has raised over $77 million in funding from investors including Benchmark, NVIDIA, Mayfield, and Y Combinator, garnering recognition from Forbes as one of America's most promising AI companies and from Gartner as a Cool Vendor for Data and AI.

- **Role:** Co-Founder & CEO at MindsDB
- **Organizations:** MindsDB, University of California Berkeley, Y Combinator, DataCRM Soluciones, Real Life Analytics, Stanford Latino Entrepreneurship Initiative
- **Nationality:** Colombian-American
- **Education:** Master's in Information Systems / Computer Systems (Applied Machine Learning), Australian National University, Visiting Research Scholar - Machine Learning Automation and Explainability, University of California, Berkeley, Entrepreneurship Program, Stanford Latino Entrepreneurship Initiative, W20 Batch (MindsDB), Y Combinator
- **Known for:** Co-founded MindsDB, which has 150,000+ open-source deployments and is used by 100+ startups and SMBs, Raised over $77 million in total funding from Benchmark, NVIDIA, Mayfield, Y Combinator, Walden Catalyst, and OpenOcean, Named by Forbes as Co-Founder of one of America's most promising AI companies (2021)

## Career timeline

- **2008** — Joined Couchsurfing as first full-time engineer in Berkeley, CA; helped scale the platform from thousands to 4 million users
- **2008** — Co-founded DataCRM Soluciones; served as board member
- **2008** — Audited UC Berkeley's CS188 Introduction to AI course under Professor John DeNero — a pivotal career-shaping moment
- **2014** — Senior Software Engineer at Skillshare.com; led video infrastructure migration to a top CDN
- **2015** — Co-founded Real Life Analytics; served as CTO building computer vision systems for out-of-home advertising
- **2016** — Lead Engineer at CareJourney; worked with Aneesh Chopra (first US government CTO) on data systems analyzing billions of patient records
- **2018** — Co-founded MindsDB with Adam Carrigan; released initial open-source code to the public
- **2019** — Became Visiting Research Scholar at UC Berkeley focusing on ML Automation and Explainability
- **2020** — MindsDB graduated from Y Combinator (W20 batch)
- **2021** — Forbes named MindsDB one of America's most promising AI companies
- **2022** — Gartner recognized MindsDB as a Cool Vendor for Data and AI
- **2023** — MindsDB raised $16.5M Series A from Benchmark Capital in February
- **2023** — MindsDB secured additional investment from NVIDIA's venture arm (NVentures) in August, bringing total seed funding to $46.5M
- **2025** — MindsDB launched Model Context Protocol (MCP) integration, providing federated data access to 200+ data sources via a single server

## Achievements

- Co-founded MindsDB, which has 150,000+ open-source deployments and is used by 100+ startups and SMBs
- Raised over $77 million in total funding from Benchmark, NVIDIA, Mayfield, Y Combinator, Walden Catalyst, and OpenOcean
- Named by Forbes as Co-Founder of one of America's most promising AI companies (2021)
- Gartner Cool Vendor for Data and AI (2022)
- Visiting Research Scholar at UC Berkeley in Machine Learning Automation and Explainability
- Built MindsDB's MCP integration giving enterprises unified federated data access across 200+ sources
- Helped Couchsurfing scale from thousands to millions of users as first full-time engineer
- Y Combinator W20 alumnus
- Stanford Latino Entrepreneurship Initiative participant

## Latest updates

- **2025-05** — MindsDB launched full Model Context Protocol (MCP) support, enabling a single MCP server to federate queries across 200+ databases, applications, and data stores — eliminating data sprawl for enterprise AI.
- **2023-08** — MindsDB received investment from NVIDIA's NVentures, bringing total seed capital to $46.5M, with participation from Benchmark, Mayfield, Y Combinator, Walden Catalyst, and OpenOcean.
- **2023-06** — MindsDB closed a $25M funding round, latest seed tranche led by investors including Benchmark Capital.
- **2023-02** — MindsDB raised $16.5M from Benchmark Capital to expand machine learning integration capabilities across more developer applications.

## Links

- Website: https://mindsdb.com
- LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/torresjorge
- Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/jorgetorresai
- GitHub: https://github.com/torrmal
- Facebook: https://facebook.com/MindsDB/

---

Profile page: https://yespress.io/jorge-torres
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-05-16