Michael SaymanFounder

United States - San Francisco Bay Area

As my parents watched their Peruvian restaurant business collapse in the wake of the Great Recession, at 13 years old I was googling "how to code." Within a year, I had launched a number of iPhone apps that were raking in thousands of dollars a month, enough to keep my family afloat--and in America.

Entirely self-taught, I headed from high school straight into the professional world. By the time I was 17, I was Facebook's youngest engineer ever, building new features that interested Mark Zuckerberg. These features are now being used by more than half a billion people every day.

After I pushed Facebook to build its own version of "Stories," engagement on the platform soared across all demographics. Millions of Gen Z and Millennials returned to the app as teen engagement rose dramatically on Instagram and WhatsApp.

Experienced product manager (7 years), product designer (10 years), and software engineer (10 years). I was hired as the youngest full-time Product Manager at Google at 21, helping increase Google's market share in the short-form video space and social networking.

I recently raised $3M for the seed round of my new startup Friendly Apps. Our goal is to help people connect in ways that are friendly to their mental health & physical well-being.