# Kanjun Qiu

> Kanjun Qiu is the co-founder and CEO of Imbue, a San Francisco AI research lab building agents that reason and code while keeping humans at the helm. A CS grad from MIT who once funded her studies writing high-frequency trading algorithms, she was Dropbox's first chief of staff, co-founded the ML recruiting startup Sourceress, and now runs a lab that raised over $200M (Series B, backers including Nvidia) at a valuation north of $1 billion. She's also a general partner at Outset Capital, a Sequoia Scout, and co-author of Sew Electric, a book that teaches kids computer science through sewing.

- **Role:** CEO & Co-founder at Imbue
- **Organizations:** Imbue, Outset Capital, Sequoia Capital (Scout), The Archive, Neighborhood SF
- **Nationality:** American
- **Education:** Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Graduate researcher (High-Low Tech group), MIT Media Lab
- **Known for:** Co-founder and CEO of Imbue, an AI research lab valued at over $1 billion, Raised more than $200M (total funding ~$420M) to build reasoning-capable AI agents, First chief of staff at Dropbox during hypergrowth

## Career timeline

- **2013** — Co-authored Sew Electric, teaching computer science through sewing and electronics
- **2013** — Became first chief of staff at Dropbox, helping scale the company from ~200 to 1,200+ people
- **2015** — Worked at Ember on a laser raster projector VR headset with Josh Albrecht
- **2016** — Co-founded Sourceress, a machine-learning recruiting startup (YC 2017, raised ~$13M)
- **2019** — Named a 2020 Forbes 30 Under 30 Featured Honoree in Enterprise Technology
- **2021** — Co-founded the AI research lab Generally Intelligent
- **2023** — Rebranded Generally Intelligent as Imbue and raised $200M Series B (backers including Nvidia) at a $1B+ valuation
- **2024** — Fireside chat with Nvidia's Bryan Catanzaro at GTC on building practical reasoning agents

## Achievements

- Co-founder and CEO of Imbue, an AI research lab valued at over $1 billion
- Raised more than $200M (total funding ~$420M) to build reasoning-capable AI agents
- First chief of staff at Dropbox during hypergrowth
- Co-founded Sourceress, a YC-backed ML recruiting startup
- 2020 Forbes 30 Under 30 Featured Honoree, Enterprise Technology
- Co-author of Sew Electric
- General Partner at Outset Capital and a Sequoia Capital Scout
- Co-founded The Archive, a long-term coliving community in San Francisco

## Latest updates

- **2024-03** — Discussed building practical reasoning-and-coding agents in a fireside chat with Nvidia's Bryan Catanzaro at GTC 2024.
- **2024-10** — Spoke on 'the AI paradox' and human agency at the 2024 Progress Conference.
- **2026-04** — Slated for a Q&A as Imbue co-founder and CEO at HumanX 2026 in San Francisco.

## Links

- Website: https://www.kanjun.me/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kanjun/
- Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/kanjun
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKDWKuxjqT0
- Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/kanjun.bsky.social

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/kanjun-qiu
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-07-01