Persona
Persona sells identity verification software for businesses to manage compliance and fraud prevention, with customers including Coursera and Brex. The San Francisco-based company has raised $418M and employs 717 people.
The growth story
Persona grew from 83 to 717 employees between 2021 and 2026, raising $418M along the way, most recently a Series D in April 2025.
About
Persona provides software that helps businesses verify user identities and comply with regulations like KYC and AML. Its platform collects personal information, verifies government IDs, and automates identity-related workflows for customers in education, fintech and other sectors.
The company has grown to 717 employees and raised $418M in funding, most recently in a Series D round. Its engineering team is the largest function with 199 people, and it recruits heavily from top tech companies like Square and Google.
Founders and leadership
Engineering is Persona's largest function with 199 people. The company has a median employee tenure of 1 year, suggesting rapid scaling.
The Persona org chart
Rick Song (Co-Founder & CEO) leads 60 mapped leaders with 2 direct reports. Click +N to expand a team; names link to the person’s public profile.
Departments, and which ones grew
Headcount by function: Engineering 212 (+42% YoY), Sales 75 (+19% YoY), Information Technology 54 (+86% YoY), Operations 54 (+23% YoY), Product Management 52 (+73% YoY), Business Development 37 (+19% YoY).
Talent flow
Persona hires heavily from Square (35 alumni), Google (24) and Amazon (16). Its alumni most often move to OpenAI (6), Plaid (4) and Stripe (3). The company recruits from UC Berkeley (46 alumni) and University of Waterloo (41).
Most common previous employers of Persona staff: Square (35), Google (24), Amazon (16), Scale AI (14), Dropbox (13), Microsoft (13). Former Persona employees most often moved to OpenAI (6), Plaid (4), Stripe (3), Bloomberg (3), Clay (2), Notion (2).
Alumni worth knowing
The Persona mafia
Persona alumni have founded 7 companies, including Outcast Ventures, Scoop (YC F25) and Hyperblob Studio.
7Andy Chen, was Board Member until 2025Vincent Park, was Product Manager until 2025Milton Ren, was Product Engineer until 2023Maciej Badowski, was Offset Print Floor Support until 2012Massoud Borhani, was Data Science until 2025Alex Funk, was Sales Engineer until 2025
Syed Fahim, was Technical Escalation & Client Support until 2019Hiring now
Web traffic
Traffic mix: 47% direct, 5% search, 28% social, 1% paid.
What this company is made of
Most common skills at Persona: Python (Programming Language) (206), Leadership (194), Microsoft Office (175), Microsoft Excel (171), SQL (157), Project Management (155), Java (148), JavaScript (144).
Where the team actually sits
Persona people are concentrated in California, United States (244), San Francisco Bay Area (91), New York, United States (36), United States (34).
Search footprint
Persona attracts about 43,840 organic search visits a month, traffic worth roughly $128K a month if bought through ads. It gained 5,450 ranking keywords and lost 3,693 in the last period.
What employees say
- Compensation
- 4.00 / 5
- Career opportunities
- 3.90 / 5
- Senior management
- 3.90 / 5
- Work-life balance
- 3.90 / 5
Frequently asked
Persona has 717 employees as of September 2026.
Persona has raised $418M in total, most recently a Series D round in April 2025.
Persona was founded in 2018 by Charles Yeh.
Rick Song (Co-Founder & CEO) sits at the top of Persona's reporting structure, with 2 direct reports.
The most common previous employers of current Persona staff are Square (35 people), Google (24 people), Amazon (16 people).
Former Persona employees most often move to OpenAI (6), Plaid (4), Stripe (3).
At least 7 companies have a founder who previously worked at Persona, including Outcast Ventures, Scoop (YC F25), Hyperblob Studio.
Persona attracts about 43,840 organic search visits a month, worth roughly $128K a month in equivalent ad spend.
The most common skills among Persona staff are Python (Programming Language), Leadership, Microsoft Office, Microsoft Excel, SQL.
Persona staff are concentrated in California, United States (244), San Francisco Bay Area (91), New York, United States (36).
Persona has about 212 people in Engineering, up 42% over the past year, as of September 2026.
Persona has about 75 people in Sales, up 19% over the past year, as of September 2026.
Computed from 535 current and 185 former Persona profiles, as of September 2026. Source: Crustdata.
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