| Devin Finzer | |
| Education: | Brown University |
| Known For: | Co-founder and CEO of OpenSea |
Devin Finzer (born 1990) is an American entrepreneur and technology executive. He is the co-founder and chief executive officer of OpenSea, a marketplace for non-fungible tokens.[1] In January 2022, Forbes estimated the stakes in OpenSea owned by Finzer and his co-founder Alex Atallah to be worth $2.2 billion each, making them the first two non-fungible token billionaires.[2]
Devin Finzer was born in 1990; his mother is a physician while his father works as a software engineer.[3] [4] Finzer grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area and attended Miramonte High School in Orinda, California.[5] [6]
Finzer matriculated at Brown University, where he earned a bachelor's degree in Computer Science and Mathematics in 2013. In his junior year at Brown, Finzer worked with future Figma founder Dylan Field to create CourseKick, a socially-oriented search engine for university course registration.[7] Just two weeks after the site launched, 20% of undergraduates had registered.[8] While at Brown, Finzer interned at Wikimedia Foundation, Google Cloud Platform, and Flipboard. After graduating, he took a job at Pinterest in San Francisco as a software engineer.[3] [9]
Finzer co-founded two tech start-ups, including Claimdog, a personal finance app acquired by Credit Karma for an undisclosed amount.[2] At Credit Karma, Finzer became interested in blockchain technology. With Alex Atallah, Finzer developed and pitched WifiCoin, which would offer tokens in exchange for sharing access to a wireless router. The pair pitched the concept to Y Combinator and were accepted. Inspired by the release of CryptoKitties, the pair pivoted to the non-fungible token market, founding OpenSea in December 2017.[2]
After a 2018 pre-seed round by Y Combinator, OpenSea raised $2.1 million in venture capital in November 2019. In March 2021, the company raised $23 million in venture capital; four months later the company announced another investment round of $100 million making it a unicorn.[10] In January 2022, OpenSea raised $300 million in new series C funding, propelling the company's valuation to $13.3 billion.[11]
In July 2021, Finzer was listed 19th on Forbes "NFTy 50" list of most influential individuals in the non-fungible token scene.[12]