Apoorva Mehta used to work down the hall from us at SomaCentral, a shared office space retrofitted out of an old law firm on Townsend. He and his buddy would be heads down in their laptops every time we walk past their bullpen corner.
They were busy building out a legal tool slash social network slash law something slash annotation something slash whatever. The plan didn't so much change but rather morph every time I said hi.
They were smart though, so I figured they would hit it whenever they get to it. Though they've been at this for awhile now.
While most others tried to keep a social factor going on at the space, they tend to be so busy they would avoid it. Though and now then I do remember getting to grab a drink with them.
A few years later, settling in my new job in Berkeley/Oakland I called up Instacart to deliver me some groceries. But it was only last year I finally looked up the company profile and soon realized it's the same Apoorva Mehta.
From being that dude to 3 billion dollars in a matter of five years is--to quote another commenter--insane.
But he's keeping the silicon valley dream alive.
That's pretty nifty in itself.
The rest of us are just hanging out here writing comments.