# Lightdash

> Lightdash is an open-source business intelligence platform built natively on dbt. It turns a data team's dbt models into a governed semantic layer, letting analysts define metrics as code and letting everyone else explore data - and, increasingly, ask AI agents questions - without writing SQL. Founded in 2020 (originally as Hubble in Y Combinator's S20 batch), it positions itself as an open, developer-first alternative to Looker and is backed by Accel, Shopify Ventures, Operator Partners and Y Combinator.

- **Founded:** 2020
- **Headquarters:** San Francisco, California, United States
- **Founders:** Hamzah Chaudhary (Co-founder & CEO), Oliver Laslett (Co-founder & CTO)
- **Team size:** ~13-30 employees, distributed across Europe and the US
- **Products:** Lightdash (open source), Lightdash Cloud, BI as Code / dashboards-as-code, Lightdash AI Agents
- **Notable:** Graduated from Y Combinator (S20 batch, originally as Hubble), Raised $11M Series A led by Accel in October 2024, bringing total funding to ~$19.4M, Grew revenue roughly 7x year-over-year

## Products & services

- **Lightdash (open source)** — Open-source BI platform that connects to a dbt project and turns its models into an explorable, governed semantic layer with charts, dashboards and self-serve exploration - no SQL required.
- **Lightdash Cloud** — Hosted, managed version of Lightdash with enterprise features: user permissions, security tooling, multi-region deployment and support.
- **BI as Code / dashboards-as-code** — Workflow that lets teams review, test and merge BI changes through version control, CI/CD, CLI tools and preview environments.
- **Lightdash AI Agents** — Scoped AI analysts (in the UI or Slack) that answer natural-language questions grounded in the governed semantic layer, plus an MCP server so external tools like Claude and Cursor can query the same metrics.

## Achievements

- Graduated from Y Combinator (S20 batch, originally as Hubble)
- Raised $11M Series A led by Accel in October 2024, bringing total funding to ~$19.4M
- Grew revenue roughly 7x year-over-year
- Adopted by 5,000+ data teams including Workday, Hypebeast and Morning Brew
- Launched one of the first BI-native AI data analysts grounded in a governed semantic layer

## Latest updates

- **2024-10** — Raised $11M Series A led by Accel and launched its first AI data analyst.
- **2025-06** — Presented its open semantic layer positioning at the Databricks Data + AI Summit, framing the semantic layer as the foundation for AI-first analytics.
- **2024-10** — Introduced scoped AI agents (marketing, sales, etc.) usable in the UI and Slack, plus an MCP server for external AI tools.

## Links

- Website: https://lightdash.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/lightdash
- Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/lightdash_devs
- GitHub: https://github.com/lightdash/lightdash
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@lightdash

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/lightdash
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-07-11