Ryo Chikazawa is the co-founder and CEO of Autify, an AI-powered software testing automation company based in San Francisco and Tokyo. A software engineer who worked in Japan, Singapore, and the US, he kept running into the same problem everywhere: testing software takes too long. After eight pivots and interviewing 70+ prospects, he built Autify into a no-code test automation platform used by companies like Unity, DeNA, and ZOZO, raising roughly $32M through Series B and launching Autify Genesis, an autonomous AI testing agent.
Checkly is a developer-first synthetic monitoring and reliability platform that lets engineering teams define uptime, API, and browser checks as version-controlled code. Built on Microsoft's Playwright framework and OpenTelemetry, it runs checks from 20+ global locations and layers in AI-driven root cause analysis. Founded in 2018 and headquartered with roots in Berlin, Checkly serves 1,000+ customers - including Vercel, 1Password, CrowdStrike, and Mistral - and has raised $32.25M, most recently a $20M Series B led by Balderton Capital in 2024.
Hannes Lenke is the CEO and co-founder of Checkly, a code-first synthetic monitoring platform that helps engineering teams detect and resolve production issues faster. A serial founder in the software testing and reliability space, he earlier built TestObject, a mobile testing startup acquired by Sauce Labs in 2016, where he then ran EMEA operations. He teamed up with Tim Nolet and Timo Euteneuer to launch Checkly, popularizing the 'Monitoring as Code' approach built around Playwright and OpenTelemetry. Checkly has raised $32.25M to date, including a $20M Series B led by Balderton Capital in 2024.
Autify is an AI-powered software testing platform that lets engineering and QA teams create, run, and maintain automated tests without heavy scripting. Founded in 2016 by Ryo Chikazawa and Sam Yamashita, the company pairs no-code recording with autonomous AI agents that generate test cases from requirements, write test code, and self-heal tests when the underlying app changes. With offices in San Francisco and Tokyo, Autify serves web and mobile teams at companies like DeNA, NEC, Yahoo, and ZOZO, and has raised roughly $29-32M across seed, Series A, and a 2024 Series B.
Kernel is a San Francisco startup building browser infrastructure for AI agents and web automations. Its cloud browsers launch in a few hundred milliseconds, persist login state across workflows, and evade bot detection, letting developers point agents at the live web without operating their own browser fleet. Backed by Accel and Y Combinator, Kernel raised $22M and says it is used by thousands of teams building agents, including Cash App and Rye.
Checksum.ai is an AI software-testing company that automatically writes and maintains end-to-end tests for web applications. Its AI agents learn from real user sessions to generate production-ready Playwright and Cypress tests, then auto-heal them when the app changes - so engineering teams get broad test coverage in days instead of months and stop babysitting flaky test suites. Founded in 2022 and built inside the super{set} startup studio, the San Francisco company serves developers and QA teams who want to ship fast without breaking things.
Gal Vered is the co-founder and CEO of Checksum.ai, a San Francisco startup that uses AI to automatically generate, run, and self-heal end-to-end software tests in Playwright and Cypress. A former Google product manager, Y Combinator-backed CTO, Kellogg MBA, and Israeli Navy officer, Vered is betting that as AI writes more of the world's code, the scarce and valuable skill becomes verification - proving the software actually works. Checksum sells testing as a result rather than a tool, generating 100-150 tests in a customer's first week and keeping them green as the product changes.
ThinkSys Inc is a global technology services, software engineering, and consulting company founded in 2012 and headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, with delivery operations in Noida, India. It specializes in quality assurance and software testing, QA automation, custom software development, DevOps, and cloud (AWS) consulting, serving 300+ clients across SaaS, FinTech, healthcare, retail, e-commerce, and education. Fully CMMI Level-3 and ISO 27001 certified, the firm pairs an engineering-first culture with a reputation for top-rated client reviews on G2 and Clutch.
Chromatic is a cloud platform for frontend UI testing and review, built by the team behind the open-source tool Storybook. It runs visual, interaction, and accessibility tests across real browsers to catch UI regressions before they ship, then layers on a team review workflow so designers, PMs, and engineers can sign off on changes. Used by teams at GitHub, Adobe, the BBC, Square, and Monday.com, Chromatic turns the messy, manual job of UI QA into an automated step in the CI pipeline.