# Nicholas Donahue

> Nicholas Donahue is the San Francisco-based founder and CEO of Drafted, an AI home-design company, and the former co-founder and CEO of Atmos. Raised in North Carolina in a homebuilding family, he left North Carolina State University, worked at Dell and Hilo, and co-founded NextUp Music before building Atmos. Atmos joined YC S20 and closed in early 2025; Drafted joined YC Spring 2026 and announced a $16 million seed round in May 2026.

- **Role:** Founder and CEO at Drafted
- **Organizations:** Drafted, Atmos, NextUp Music, Hilo, Dell Technologies, Y Combinator
- **Education:** Mechanical engineering studies; left without graduating, North Carolina State University
- **Known for:** Co-founded Atmos, a platform connecting custom-home buyers with land, design and building partners., Selected with Atmos’s co-founders for Forbes 30 Under 30 Consumer Technology 2021., Built two YC-backed companies: Atmos (S20) and Drafted (Spring 2026).

## Career timeline

- **2016-2018** — Co-founded NextUp Music, a shared music-queue app.
- **2017** — Completed a process-engineering co-op at Dell Technologies.
- **2018-2019** — Worked on Hilo’s founding team as community director.
- **2018** — Co-founded Atmos with Trent Hedge, Austin Kahn and Matthew Rastovac.
- **2020** — Atmos participated in Y Combinator’s Summer 2020 batch.
- **2021** — Named with Atmos’s co-founders to Forbes 30 Under 30 Consumer Technology 2021.
- **2022** — Atmos announced a $12.5 million Series A.
- **2025** — Atmos closed in early 2025; Donahue founded Drafted later in the year.
- **2026** — Drafted joined YC’s Spring 2026 batch and announced a $16 million seed round in May.

## Achievements

- Co-founded Atmos, a platform connecting custom-home buyers with land, design and building partners.
- Selected with Atmos’s co-founders for Forbes 30 Under 30 Consumer Technology 2021.
- Built two YC-backed companies: Atmos (S20) and Drafted (Spring 2026).
- Drafted announced a $16 million seed round led by Buckley Ventures in May 2026.

## Latest updates

- **2026-05** — Drafted announced a $16 million seed round led by Buckley Ventures. In the announcement, Donahue reported more than 120,000 users and over 325,000 home designs generated in the preceding month.
- **2026-05** — Discussed Drafted and AI-assisted schematic design on the Connected Design Podcast, published May 18.

## Links

- Website: https://www.drafted.ai/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicholas-donahue-0b77b7128/
- Twitter/X: https://x.com/PrimalNick

---

Profile page: https://yespress.io/nicholas-donahue
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-10-24