# Paul Davison

> Paul Davison is the co-founder and CEO of Clubhouse, the live audio social platform that hit a $4 billion valuation within a year of launch during the COVID-19 pandemic. A Stanford-trained industrial engineer turned serial entrepreneur, Davison previously co-founded Highlight (acquired by Pinterest in 2016) and served briefly as CEO of CoinList. His career has centered on one obsession: giving people better ways to find each other and talk. Clubhouse - which he built with co-founder Rohan Seth - brought the intimacy of voice to the scale of a social network, attracting tens of millions of users and sparking a live-audio wave across the industry.

- **Role:** Co-founder and CEO at Clubhouse
- **Organizations:** Clubhouse, Highlight, CoinList, Metaweb Technologies, Benchmark Capital, Bain & Company
- **From:** San Diego, United States
- **Nationality:** American
- **Education:** Bachelor of Science, Industrial Engineering, Stanford University, MBA (Arjay Miller Scholar), Stanford Graduate School of Business
- **Known for:** Co-founded Clubhouse which reached $4 billion valuation within one year of launch, Built and sold Highlight to Pinterest (2016), Part of early team at Metaweb Technologies, acquired by Google (2010)

## Career timeline

- **2002** — Graduated Stanford with BS in Industrial Engineering
- **2002-2005** — Senior Associate Consultant at Bain & Company
- **2005-2007** — MBA at Stanford GSB; Google internship (Summer 2006)
- **2007-2010** — VP at Metaweb Technologies (semantic graph search startup, acquired by Google in 2010)
- **2010-2011** — Entrepreneur in Residence at Benchmark Capital
- **2011-2016** — Founder and CEO of Highlight, location-based people-discovery app (acquired by Pinterest 2016)
- **2012** — Highlight becomes the sensation of SXSW conference
- **2016** — Highlight acquired by Pinterest
- **2018** — Served as CEO of CoinList (blockchain fundraising platform); continues as advisor
- **2020** — Co-founded Clubhouse with Rohan Seth; launched March 2020 as invite-only iOS app
- **2021** — Clubhouse reaches $4 billion valuation; raises $110M+ Series C in April 2021
- **2023** — Led difficult decision to cut Clubhouse staff by 50%+ to refocus product
- **2024-2026** — Continuing to build Clubhouse - launched Clubhouse Plus, creator donations, public rooms

## Achievements

- Co-founded Clubhouse which reached $4 billion valuation within one year of launch
- Built and sold Highlight to Pinterest (2016)
- Part of early team at Metaweb Technologies, acquired by Google (2010)
- Named Arjay Miller Scholar at Stanford Graduate School of Business
- Raised over $310 million in total funding for Clubhouse from investors including a16z, DST Global, Elad Gil, and Naval Ravikant
- Grew Clubhouse to tens of millions of users without paying for user acquisition
- Pioneered the live audio social networking category

## Latest updates

- **2026-03** — Clubhouse experienced downtime incidents (March 25-27, 2026); team working on stability improvements
- **2025-12** — Clubhouse rolled out creator donations feature to approximately 60,000 creators; platform takes no cut
- **2025** — Launched Clubhouse Plus premium subscription tier with profile customization and enhanced features
- **2024** — Took House rooms public on iOS and Android, opening previously invite-only rooms to wider audiences
- **2023-04** — Announced 50%+ staff reduction to refocus Clubhouse on core product evolution with smaller, faster team

## Links

- Website: https://clubhouse.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davison
- Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/pdavison
- Facebook: https://facebook.com/Clubhouse-Official-102101821809396/

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/paul-davison
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-05-24