Hello, I'm Vinayak

I build teams and products
Currently CEO at Drafted
Previously DirEng at KAYAK
MIT Course 6, built in Boston

Current Projects

Drafted
Layoff List
PitchClub
Blacklivesmatter.tech
US Layoff Data

Follow me on

Twitter
Medium
LinkedIn

Companies I'm cheering for

Appcues
Branch
GetHuman
Knoq
Lola
Meenta
Pilot
Tettra
+ Invest with me

My Story

I was born in the United States to Indian parents, and we moved back to India when I was still in kindergarten. I came back to the United States when I was 17 to go to MIT.

While in college, I experimented by working in a NASA student research program, in a Computational Genomics lab, and at a hedgefund. Surprisingly, I had the most fun at the hedgefund because that’s where I discovered I was better at making products that generated immediate value, rather than longer term research which was better suited for people smarter than me.

After completing a couple of degrees, I worked as a software engineer at KAYAK thanks to Paul English. Eventually, I became a Director of Engineering for the KAYAK Mobile team. Surprisingly, my biggest learning from KAYAK was the incredible value of being able to build a superstar team, and learning how to be a good manager from Bill O’Donnell.

Eventually, I started Drafted based on some of the ideas around referrals and network recruiting that I’d been thinking about over the years.

On my personal time, I did some retail investing at first, with my first savings from my engineering job at KAYAK. When I left KAYAK, I took some opportunities to advise or invest in other startups - mostly as a learning tool to make me a better founder.