Jessica Livingston

Jessica Livingston is an American author and venture investor who co-founded the startup accelerator Y Combinator in 2005 with Paul Graham, Robert Morris, and Trevor Blackwell. Reddit was among the companies funded in Y Combinator's very first batch in the summer of 2005, giving Livingston a documented tie to the company from its origin; she has often been credited with the partner instinct for judging founders that informed early Y Combinator decisions. She is the author of 'Founders at Work,' a collection of interviews with startup founders, and she founded Y Combinator's Startup School events. She was also among the individually named investors who participated in Reddit's 2014 financing round. Through Y Combinator and as an angel investor she has been associated with a large portfolio of early-stage technology companies, and her relationship with Reddit spans both its founding cohort and its later fundraising.