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Soham Parekh seemed the archetype of an ideal software savant. The dilemma? A deluge of tech startups had come to the same revelation.
Over the past several days, no fewer than a dozen technology executives have publicly declared that Parekh had been listed as a current or recent hire on their rosters — igniting a digital maelstrom across tech circles about clandestine remote employment and the burgeoning trend of engineers orchestrating parallel job stints.
Parekh’s name gained notoriety after Suhail Doshi, erstwhile CEO of the analytics platform Mixpanel, aired a cautionary post on X, unmasking Parekh’s alleged modus operandi of moonlighting across multiple startups — many funded by the prestigious Y Combinator.
“Public Service Alert: There’s an individual named Soham Parekh (residing in India) juggling simultaneous employment at three to four startups. He’s been exploiting YC-backed ventures and others. Exercise vigilance,” Doshi posted.
“I terminated his engagement within the inaugural week after discovering his duplicity. Despite that, the duplicity persists a year on. Enough excuses,” Doshi continued, declining to respond to outreach.
Responses to the post reflected shared exasperation.
“Just onboarded him for a trial. Saw this tweet. Called it off immediately. Grateful for the heads-up!” one comment read.
“LMFAOOO I INTERVIEWED THIS GUY YESTERDAY BRO IM DYINGG,” wrote another user, half-horrified, half-amused.
As the digital uproar intensified, Parekh himself stepped into the limelight with public interviews.
In a segment aired Thursday on the tech-centric show “TBPN,” Parekh confessed to concurrently managing numerous employment contracts.
“I don’t champion what I did,” he remarked with a solemn tone. “I wouldn’t advocate for it either. But I was in economic despair. Nobody enjoys clocking in 140-hour weeks. This wasn’t ambition. It was survival.”
To navigate the labyrinth of overlapping obligations, Parekh revealed he lived in a cycle of relentless code and near-zero repose. He rebuffed conspiracies alleging he employed a ghost team or leveraged generative AI to expand his workload reach.
The Wall Street Journal recently noted a modest uptick in Americans holding multiple jobs — climbing from 5.3% to 5.5%.
In a digital tête-à-tête on X with Andriy Mulyar, chief of Nomic AI (another Parekh employer), he acknowledged maintaining up to four concurrent roles, each potentially offering six-figure remuneration.
He claimed a cumulative monthly yield hovering between $30,000 and $40,000. Mulyar affirmed the legitimacy of the X conversation and Parekh’s prior tenure with Nomic AI.
During the “TBPN” interview, Parekh disclosed that his dual-life saga commenced in 2022. Financial duress had coerced him into rejecting graduate school and settling for an online curriculum instead.
A résumé screenshot shared by Doshi — verified as authentic by Create founder Marcus Lowe — stated Parekh’s Georgia Tech enrollment from September 2020 to May 2022. However, a university spokesperson clarified that no such record of Parekh exists.
“There’s a tidal wave of judgment right now, and most only grasp fragments of the narrative,” Parekh later posted from his verified X handle. “If there’s a single immutable truth about me — I build.
That’s what I do. I’ve been exiled, doubted, ostracized by peers and companies alike. But building remains my core. It always will.”
Marcus Lowe of Create recounted a similar encounter. Parekh had impressed deeply during his in-person evaluation in February, outperforming the bulk of the talent pool. Yet, the descent into excuses began swiftly — citing illness, familial obligations, and more — each delaying his actual onboarding.
“I began noticing oddities,” Lowe shared. “Despite being ‘ill,’ he was submitting fresh code on GitHub the same week. That inconsistency raised red flags.”
Digging deeper, Lowe discovered Parekh was actively coding for another venture — sync.so. A simple message to the founder confirmed the double-duty reality.
“For a lean startup like ours, this felt like sabotage,” Lowe said. “It wasn’t just time lost. It was trust broken. We’re battling for existence here.”
Parekh’s digital fingerprint — images, videos, mentions — appears across sync.so’s platforms. While employees confirmed his presence there, they declined to offer detailed commentary.
Parekh has since vowed to dedicate himself to a solitary employer. He’s reportedly signed on with a startup named Darwin.
Sanjit Juneja, Darwin’s founder and CEO, conveyed via email, “At Darwin, we are laser-focused on crafting boundary-pushing software for brands and creators. Soham is immensely skilled, and we trust his capacity to contribute meaningfully to our vision.”
