Chamath Palihapitiya

Chamath Palihapitiya
Born	3 9, 1976
Birthplace	Galle, Sri Lanka
Nationality	Canadian, American
Occupation	Venture capitalist, entrepreneur
Known for	Founder and CEO of Social Capital, former Facebook executive, co-host of the All-In Podcast
Education	University of Waterloo (BASc)

Chamath Palihapitiya (born 3 September 1976) is a Canadian-American venture capitalist, entrepreneur, and technology executive who founded and leads Social Capital, a venture capital firm he launched in 2011. Before establishing his own firm, Palihapitiya served as a senior executive at Facebook from 2007 to 2011, where he played a central role in the company's user growth strategy during a critical period of its expansion. Born in Sri Lanka and raised in Canada after his family immigrated when he was a child, Palihapitiya's trajectory from modest immigrant beginnings to the upper echelons of Silicon Valley finance has made him one of the most prominent — and at times polarizing — figures in the technology investment world. Through Social Capital, he has invested in a range of technology and healthcare companies, and he became particularly well known for championing special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC) deals in the early 2020s, earning the moniker "SPAC King" in financial media. He also held a minority ownership stake in the Golden State Warriors of the National Basketball Association and co-hosts the All-In Podcast, a weekly business and technology program launched in 2021 alongside co-hosts Jason Calacanis, David Sacks, and David Friedberg.

Early Life

Chamath Palihapitiya was born on 3 September 1976 in Galle, Sri Lanka. His family emigrated from Sri Lanka to Canada when he was young. The family settled in Ottawa, Ontario, where Palihapitiya grew up. In a 2017 interview with The New York Times, Palihapitiya discussed elements of his upbringing, noting the challenges his family faced as immigrants adjusting to life in Canada.

Palihapitiya attended Lisgar Collegiate Institute, a historic secondary school in Ottawa. Lisgar Collegiate, one of the oldest public high schools in Ontario, counts Palihapitiya among its notable graduates. The experience of growing up in a family that had limited financial resources shaped Palihapitiya's perspective on wealth, opportunity, and social mobility — themes he would return to frequently in his later public commentary and investment philosophy.

His background as a Sri Lankan-born immigrant to Canada, and later the United States, has been a recurring element in media profiles. A 2015 Business Insider profile documented his rise from modest circumstances to becoming a multimillionaire through his work at Facebook and subsequent ventures. A 2025 profile in The Times of India described Palihapitiya as a "Sri Lankan venture capitalist" while covering his evolving political views.

Education

Palihapitiya attended the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada, where he earned a Bachelor of Applied Science (BASc) degree. The University of Waterloo, known particularly for its engineering and technology programs, provided Palihapitiya with a technical foundation that would inform his later career in the technology sector. Following his undergraduate education, Palihapitiya pursued a career in the technology industry, initially working at companies in the early internet era before making his way to Silicon Valley.

Career

Early Career

Before joining Facebook, Palihapitiya worked in various roles in the technology industry. His career trajectory brought him from Canada to the United States, where he became part of the burgeoning Silicon Valley technology ecosystem. The details of his pre-Facebook career included positions at technology companies during the late 1990s and early 2000s, a period of rapid growth and transformation in the internet industry.

Facebook (2007–2011)

Palihapitiya joined Facebook in 2007 as a vice president, taking on a senior executive role during a pivotal period in the company's history. At Facebook, he was responsible for overseeing user growth — a function that proved critical to the social network's expansion from a college-focused platform to a global communication tool with hundreds of millions of users. His work on user growth strategies helped establish the frameworks and metrics-driven approaches that became standard practice in the technology industry.

Palihapitiya departed Facebook in 2011 to launch his own venture capital firm. His time at the company, during which Facebook's user base grew substantially, provided him with both significant financial resources and a high-profile platform from which to launch his next career phase.

In December 2017, Palihapitiya made headlines when he publicly criticized Facebook and social media more broadly. Speaking at a Stanford Graduate School of Business event, he expressed concern about the impact of social media on society, stating that the tools created by companies like Facebook were "ripping apart the social fabric of how society works." He said he felt "tremendous guilt" about his role in building Facebook's growth engine. The remarks drew significant media attention and were widely covered internationally. Palihapitiya subsequently provided additional context to his comments, clarifying some of his statements while maintaining his overall critique.

Social Capital

In 2011, Palihapitiya founded Social Capital (originally named The Social+Capital Partnership), a venture capital firm based in Palo Alto, California. The firm was established with the stated goal of investing in technology companies that addressed major societal problems, including those in healthcare, education, and financial services.

Social Capital's first major investments drew attention in the venture capital community. In November 2011, the firm participated in a $15 million funding round for SecondMarket at a $200 million valuation, one of its early notable investments as Palihapitiya transitioned from operator to investor.

In March 2013, Social Capital Partnership confirmed a new fund, signaling the firm's ambitions to expand its investment portfolio. The firm positioned itself as an organization focused on both financial returns and social impact, a dual mandate that distinguished it from many traditional venture capital firms at the time.

By 2015, Social Capital had grown into a significant force in Silicon Valley venture capital. A Fortune profile that year asked whether Palihapitiya represented "the future of venture capital," noting his unconventional approach to investing and his willingness to challenge established norms within the industry. The firm's portfolio encompassed investments across multiple sectors, with a particular emphasis on technology-driven solutions in healthcare and enterprise software.

SPAC Deals

Palihapitiya became one of the most prominent advocates and practitioners of special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC) deals, earning him the nickname "SPAC King" in financial media. SPACs, also known as blank-check companies, are shell corporations listed on a stock exchange for the purpose of acquiring a private company, thereby making it public without a traditional initial public offering.

One of Palihapitiya's most high-profile SPAC transactions was the deal involving Virgin Galactic, the space tourism company founded by Richard Branson. In 2019, Social Capital Hedosophia Holdings, one of Palihapitiya's SPAC vehicles, completed a $720 million blank-check deal to take Virgin Galactic public. The transaction drew significant attention both for its size and for the profile of the company involved, occurring during a period when traditional IPO activity had slowed.

Palihapitiya went on to sponsor multiple SPAC vehicles, taking several companies public through this mechanism. His SPAC activity peaked in the early 2020s during a broader surge in SPAC issuance across the financial markets. However, as the SPAC market cooled and some SPAC-merged companies underperformed, the model faced increased scrutiny from regulators and investors.

In August 2025, Axios reported that Palihapitiya was returning to the SPAC market, describing his return with his "crown dented but confidence unbowed." The report indicated that despite the mixed track record of the broader SPAC market, Palihapitiya was launching new SPAC activity, signaling his continued belief in the model as a vehicle for taking companies public.

Recent Investments and Activities

Palihapitiya continued to make notable investments through Social Capital and related vehicles. In late 2025 and early 2026, he drew attention for his investment in Groq, an artificial intelligence chip company. When Nvidia announced a $20.6 billion acquisition of Groq, Palihapitiya stood to make a substantial return on his investment. Financial media reported that the deal represented a significant windfall for the venture capitalist. However, Palihapitiya reportedly said that despite the financial gain, he "felt incredibly down" following the transaction, suggesting a complex emotional relationship with investment exits.

In early 2026, Palihapitiya shared his top investment recommendation for the year, suggesting that the best artificial intelligence investment for 2026 was not a stock but rather another form of investment opportunity. The recommendation was covered by both Yahoo Finance and The Motley Fool.

Palihapitiya also commented publicly on policy issues, including a proposed California billionaire tax. In early 2026, he stated that people with significant wealth had "scrambled and left California" in response to the proposed tax, warning that the measure would deepen the state's budget deficit rather than raise revenue.

In February 2026, Palihapitiya discussed the investment performance of Warren Buffett, highlighting a pattern in Buffett's returns and how regulation had changed the landscape for the type of investing Buffett had historically practiced. As the founder of Social Capital, Palihapitiya's analysis of Buffett's track record drew interest from financial media.

The All-In Podcast

In 2021, Palihapitiya co-launched the All-In Podcast alongside Jason Calacanis, David Sacks, and David Friedberg. The weekly program covers topics related to startup investing, technology policy, economics, and current events. The four hosts, sometimes referred to as the "besties," bring perspectives from venture capital and technology entrepreneurship. The podcast has attracted a significant audience within the technology and business communities and has become a notable platform for discussion of Silicon Valley issues and broader economic policy.

Personal Life

Palihapitiya has been a public figure whose personal life has occasionally intersected with his business activities. He held a minority ownership stake in the Golden State Warriors, the NBA franchise based in San Francisco, though he later divested this stake.

Palihapitiya's political evolution has been the subject of media coverage. In 2025, The Times of India reported that Palihapitiya, a former donor to Democratic causes, had shifted his political alignment. He stated that he had been "red-pilled" by what he described as bias in major U.S. newsrooms, which he credited with turning him away from his previous political affiliations. The report described him as a "Democrat-donor-turned MAGA billionaire," reflecting a public transformation in his political identity.

Palihapitiya holds both Canadian and American citizenship, reflecting his immigration from Sri Lanka to Canada and his subsequent move to the United States, where he has been based for the majority of his professional career.

Recognition

Palihapitiya has received significant attention from business and technology media throughout his career. His 2015 profile in Fortune highlighted his influence in venture capital and posed the question of whether his approach represented the future of the industry. A 2017 New York Times "Corner Office" feature profiled his management philosophy and approach to investing.

His criticism of Facebook in December 2017 brought him to the attention of a broader international audience. The remarks, covered by The Guardian and numerous other outlets, positioned Palihapitiya as one of the first major Silicon Valley insiders to openly criticize the social media platforms he had helped build.

Palihapitiya's SPAC activities made him one of the most covered figures in financial media during the early 2020s. The "SPAC King" moniker, used by outlets including Yahoo Finance and The Motley Fool, reflected his prominence in that market segment. The Virgin Galactic deal via Social Capital Hedosophia Holdings was covered by Reuters and other major financial news outlets as a notable transaction in the SPAC space.

His investment in Groq and the subsequent Nvidia acquisition generated additional media coverage, with financial outlets tracking the potential returns for Palihapitiya and other early investors in the AI chip company.

The All-In Podcast has further expanded Palihapitiya's public profile beyond the investment community, giving him a regular platform to share his views on technology, policy, and economics with a broad audience.

Legacy

Palihapitiya's career spans multiple phases of the modern technology industry, from the growth era of social media to the rise of venture capital-backed SPAC deals and the emergence of artificial intelligence as a dominant investment theme. His role at Facebook during the company's critical growth period, and his later public critique of the platform, have made him a complex figure in Silicon Valley history — someone who both helped build the social media ecosystem and subsequently expressed concern about its societal effects.

Through Social Capital, Palihapitiya introduced an approach to venture capital that emphasized both financial returns and social impact, a framework that influenced how some subsequent investors and firms positioned themselves. The firm's investments in healthcare and technology companies reflected a thesis that venture capital could be directed toward addressing large-scale societal challenges.

His extensive use of SPACs as a mechanism for taking companies public helped popularize the structure among a new generation of investors and companies, even as the broader SPAC market later faced challenges. The Virgin Galactic transaction, in particular, demonstrated the potential of SPACs for high-profile deals and contributed to the subsequent surge in SPAC activity across the financial markets.

Palihapitiya's willingness to express opinions on a wide range of topics — from technology policy to tax policy to political media — through both the All-In Podcast and public statements has made him a notable voice in debates about the role of technology and wealth in American society. His political evolution from Democratic donor to a figure aligned with Republican politics reflects broader shifts occurring among some prominent Silicon Valley figures during the 2020s.