- Facebook launched in February 2004, and it's come a long way in the last 16 years.
- Notably, almost all of the company's first 20 employees have since left the company. Only two remain, and you can probably guess who one of them is.
- Some have become venture capitalists: Kevin Colleran opened Slow Ventures, while Sean Parker worked at Founders Fund for eight years.
- Others have founded their own companies: Dustin Moskovitz launched Asana, while Steve Chen created YouTube.
- Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
Who were the people behind Facebook when it was just a startup? And where are they now?
Only two of Facebook's first 20 employees still work at the company — and you can probably guess one of them.
Most left during the social network's early days to work at other tech companies or start their own. Several have become successful investors at large VC firms; many are now absurdly rich following Facebook's IPO in 2012.
Here's where Facebook's first 20 employees are now.
Alex Heath contributed to an earlier version of this article.
Dustin Moskovitz, Facebook's first CTO, was Mark Zuckerberg's roommate. The two dropped out of Harvard together to move to California and work on Facebook.
Employed by Facebook: February 2004 to November 2009
Position: Cofounder
Where he is now: Moskovitz is the cofounder and CEO at enterprise software company Asana. He also cofounded Good Ventures, a philanthropic firm with a mission "to help humanity thrive." He has a net worth of nearly $11.6 billion, according to Forbes.
Chris Hughes cofounded Facebook and served as the site's first spokesman. He later coordinated all social networking aspects of Obama's 2008 campaign.
Employed by Facebook: February 2004 to 2007
Position at Facebook: Cofounder
Where he is now: After working on Obama's 2008 campaign, Hughes became executive director of Jumo, a startup that tried to utilize social media to change the world. In 2012, he purchased a majority stake in The New Republic and became its executive chairman and editor-in-chief. He put the magazine up for sale in 2016 after it failed to become profitable.
Hughes made $500 million when Facebook went public. He recently wrote a book called "The Fair Shot: Rethinking Inequality and How We Earn," citing his own wealth, most of which stemmed from his 2% ownership in Facebook. And in May 2019, Hughes dropped a bombshell by publishing an op-ed in The New York Times that called regulators to break up Facebook in order to protect users and competition.
Hughes is now co-chair of the Economic Security Project, a group that wants to make universal basic income a reality in the US.
Eduardo Saverin was a Facebook cofounder and its first CFO. He famously sued Mark Zuckerberg and the two reached a settlement.
Employed by Facebook: February 2004 to 2005
Position: Cofounder
Where he is now: After winning a legal battle with Facebook that let him retain his cofounder status, Saverin began angel investing in startups like Qwiki and Chris Hughes' Jumo. In 2011, Saverin renounced his US citizenship and moved to Singapore, meaning the taxes he had to pay on capital gains when Facebook went public were significantly reduced.
He says he has no hard feelings when it comes to Facebook or Mark Zuckerberg, who ousted him from the company shortly after its launch. Saverin has a net worth of roughly $10.5 billion, according to Forbes.
Sean Parker was a cofounder of Napster and was founding president of Facebook.
Employed by Facebook: June 2004 to January 2006
Position: President
Where he is now: Parker has invested in a number of tech startups, including Spotify and Asana, and was a partner at VC firm Founder's Fund until 2014. He has a personal net worth of roughly $2.7 billion, according to Forbes.
Parker is an active philanthropist, launching multiple foundations focused on cancer and public health.
Andrew McCollum designed Facebook's first logo and worked on a side project with Zuckerberg called Wirehog.
Employed by Facebook: February 2004 to September 2006
Position: Cofounder, engineer
Where he is now: McCollum joined Flybridge Capital Partners as an entrepreneur in residence in 2011, then became a partner at the VC firm NEA. He's since invested and become involved in other tech startups, such as Quilt and JobSpice, and is currently the CEO of streaming service Philo.
Taner Halicioglu was Facebook's first "real" employee outside of the founders. He built out the entire initial hardware infrastructure.
Employed by Facebook: October 2004 to November 2009
Position: Senior software/operations engineer
Where he is now: Halicioglu became the lead reliability engineer of Battle.net at Blizzard Entertainment. Now he is a lecturer at UC San Diego in the school's Computer Science and Engineering department. He recently donated $75 million to the school to create its Halicioglu Data Science Institute.
Naomi Gleit was tasked early on with making sure "literally everyone in the world was on the site." Aside from Mark Zuckerberg, she's the longest-serving employee still at the company.
Employed by Facebook: April 2005 – present
First position at Facebook: Marketing Associate
Her position now: Gleit is Facebook's vice president of social good and one of Zuckerberg's top lieutenants. She leads all of the company's efforts around safety check, fundraising tools, and similar features.
Kevin Colleran lived with Zuckerberg in Facebook's 2004 summer sublet house in Palo Alto. Now he's a VC.
Employed by Facebook: April 2005 to July 2011
Position at Facebook: Global partnerships
Where he is now: Colleran was one of the last initial employees to leave Facebook. Now, he's managing director at VC firm Slow Ventures with Dave Morin and other early Facebook employees.
Gilles Mischler built and designed Facebook's IT infrastructure from the ground up.
Employed by Facebook: June 2005 to May 2010
Position: SiteOps engineer
Where he is now: After Facebook, Mischler went to game developer Playdom. He was only there for a few weeks when the company was acquired by Disney for more than $700 million. Mischler worked at Dropbox for five years before becoming an engineer at WeWork. These days, he's retired, according to his LinkedIn.
You can thank engineer Scott Marlette for being able to visually stalk all of your friends — he created Facebook's first photo application.
Employed by Facebook: June 2005 to January 2010
Position: Engineer, product manager
Where he is now: Marlette went on to cofound medical startup GoodRx. Now, he's a partner at VC firm Slow Ventures with other early Facebook employees.
Aaron Sittig was brought on early from Napster by Sean Parker. He created the concept of tagging friends in Facebook pictures and the "like" button.
Employed by Facebook: May 2005 to December 2o10, January 2011 to December 2012
Position: Design strategy lead, product architect
Where he is now: Sittig was Facebook's first designer and a close friend of Mark Zuckerberg. He left the company in 2010 and returned in 2011 for a two-year stint as a product architect. In 2015, he became managing partner at Public Studio, a branding and design studio in San Francisco.
Nick Heyman was in charge of handling Facebook's explosive traffic, although he wasn't there for very long.
Employed by Facebook: April 2005
Position: Director of operations
Where he is now: Heyman has worked at a few other tech companies, including Twitter. He's also invested in startups such as Nuzzel and ShopPad. These days, he's a managing partner at DynoVC.
Steve King directed Facebook's media sales and was responsible for getting its first big advertisers on board, like Panasonic and Microsoft.
Employed by Facebook: April 2005 to July 2006
Position at Facebook: Director, media sales
Where he is now: After Facebook, King joined LocaModa as its VP of Sales. Now he leads a boutique real estate investment firm in the Boston area.
Tricia Black worked at Y2M, a firm that sold ads for college magazines. Facebook cofounder Eduardo Saverin set up a meeting with Black, who began selling ads for Facebook and eventually became its first VP of sales.
Employed by Facebook: March 2005 to June 2006
Position at Facebook: Vice president of advertising sales
What she's doing now: Black is the founder of AmplifyHer Ventures, a VC firm that invests in female founders and diverse teams.
Steve Chen left Facebook after a few short months to help start YouTube.
Employed by Facebook: For a few months in 2005
Position at Facebook: Senior software engineer
Where he is now: Chen went on to cofound YouTube, which he sold to Google for $1.65 billion. He cofounded another company, AVOS, in 2011. He now advises Google's investment arm, GV.
Matt Cohler was brought on by early Facebook investor Peter Thiel and was formerly one of the founding members of LinkedIn. Now, he's a partner at VC firm Benchmark Capital.
Employed by Facebook: February 2005 to October 2008
Position at Facebook: Vice president of product management
Where he is now: Cohler is a general partner at Benchmark Capital and serves on a number of startup boards, including Tinder and Asana. He briefly sat on Uber's board after taking over Bill Gurley's seat in 2017, but has since resigned.
Ezra Callahan was roommates with Sean Parker and was hired to "whittle away" at Eduardo Saverin's CFO responsibilities.
Employed by Facebook: December 2004 to July 2010
Position: Manager of internal communications, product manager
Where he is now: Callahan is cofounder and chief investment office at boutique hotel company Arrive, which has locations in cities across the country, like Palm Springs, Memphis, and Albuquerque.
James Pereira was Facebook's seventh employee. He left three years later.
Employed by Facebook: July 2004 to August 2007
Position: Engineer
Where he is now: He's a software engineer at Boy Gorilla Enterprises in Portland, Oregon, according to his Facebook profile.
Daniel Neff had a short, five-month stint as Facebook's 20th employee and was responsible for rolling out new site features.
Employed by Facebook: May 2005 to October 2005
Position at Facebook: Build/release engineer
Where he is now: Neff has been at Adobe for 11 years, according to his LinkedIn profile. He's currently an operations architect at the company.
Mark Zuckerberg founded Facebook. The blue design of the site is partially because of his red-green color blindness.
Employed by Facebook: February 2004 to present
Position: CEO and cofounder
Where he is now: Still at Facebook but much, much richer — Forbes pegs his current net worth at $69.5 billion.
BONUS: Adam D'Angelo was high school friends with Mark Zuckerberg and eventually left Facebook to cofound Quora.
Employed by Facebook: November 2006 to June 2008. (Although he technically wasn't one of the first 20 employees, D'Angleo was one of Zuckerberg's best high school friends and worked on the social network site long before he was on the payroll.)
Position at Facebook: CTO
Where he is now: D'Angelo is cofounder and CEO of Quora.
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