# Spencer Kimball

> Spencer Kimball is the co-founder and CEO of Cockroach Labs, the company behind CockroachDB, a distributed SQL database built to survive almost anything you throw at it. Long before databases, he co-wrote GIMP as a Berkeley class project in 1995, spent roughly a decade as an engineer at Google working on its file-system guts, and built a photo startup that Square acquired. He named his database after the one creature famous for being nearly impossible to kill - which turned out to be the perfect pitch.

- **Role:** Co-Founder & CEO at Cockroach Labs
- **Organizations:** Cockroach Labs, Google, Square, Viewfinder, WeGo, GIMP, UC Berkeley XCF
- **Nationality:** American
- **Education:** B.A. in Computer Science, University of California, Berkeley
- **Known for:** Co-created GIMP, one of the most widely used open-source applications ever made, Helped build Colossus, the successor to the Google File System, Founded and scaled Cockroach Labs to 500+ employees and $633M+ raised

## Career timeline

- **1995** — Co-created the first version of GIMP as a Berkeley class project with roommate Peter Mattis
- **1996** — Graduated from UC Berkeley with a B.A. in Computer Science
- **1998** — Co-founded WeGo, a web-community tools company, serving as co-CTO
- **2000** — Built OnlinePhotoLab.com, a web-based GIMP; technology later folded into Ofoto
- **2002** — Joined Google in Mountain View as an engineer
- **2004** — Relocated to Google's New York office; worked on Colossus and the Google Servlet Engine
- **2012** — Co-founded Viewfinder, a social photo-sharing app, with Peter Mattis and Brian McGinnis
- **2013** — Square acquired Viewfinder; Kimball joined Square contributing to its payments platform
- **2014** — Started CockroachDB on GitHub and co-founded Cockroach Labs
- **2021** — Cockroach Labs raised a $278M Series F

## Achievements

- Co-created GIMP, one of the most widely used open-source applications ever made
- Helped build Colossus, the successor to the Google File System
- Founded and scaled Cockroach Labs to 500+ employees and $633M+ raised
- Pioneered the distributed SQL category with CockroachDB
- Took an open-source GitHub project and turned it into mission-critical infrastructure for enterprises

## Latest updates

- **2024-11** — Cockroach Labs released its State of Resilience report and expanded its AWS partnership, with Kimball featured in CEO interviews on database resilience.

## Links

- Website: https://www.cockroachlabs.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/spencerwkimball/
- GitHub: https://github.com/spencerkimball

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/spencer-kimball
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-06-04