In a historic shift, three high school friends from California — Brendan Foody, Adarsh Hiremath, and Surya Midha — have officially become the youngest self-made billionaires in the world at just 22 years old.

Their San Francisco–based AI recruiting platform Mercor raised $350 million in its latest funding round, shooting its valuation to a staggering $10 billion. This moment officially breaks Mark Zuckerberg’s record, who became a billionaire at 23.

The story has drawn massive global attention due to the founders’ age, Indian-American representation, and Mercor’s rapid rise as one of the fastest-growing AI infrastructure companies.

✅ Who Are the Three Youngest Self-Made Billionaires?

1. Brendan Foody (CEO)

Age: 22
Background: Bellarmine College Preparatory, Bay Area
Role: Business strategy, operations, enterprise partnerships

2. Adarsh Hiremath (CTO)

Age: 22
Indian-American
Background: Harvard dropout
Role: Technology architecture, AI tooling, engineering

3. Surya Midha (Chairman, Co-founder)

Age: 22
Indian-American
Background: Stanford dropout, Thiel Fellow
Role: Product strategy, global expansion, investor relations

All three are former Thiel Fellowship recipients — a program known for backing bold young founders.

✅ What Is Mercor? Company Profile

Founded: 2023

Headquarters: San Francisco, USA

Sector: AI Recruiting, Human-in-the-Loop (HITL), AI Workforce Infrastructure

Valuation: $10 billion (as of 2025)

Funding Raised: Over $500 million+ to date

Latest Round: $350M Series C

Investors: Goldman Sachs Alternatives (lead), Founders Fund, OpenAI-linked angels, and global VCs

Mercor operates as a next-generation AI workforce marketplace that connects companies with highly skilled technical talent, specializing in:

✅ AI training
✅ Data annotation
✅ Model evaluation
✅ Software engineering
✅ Research tasks
✅ Full-stack development & ML engineering

Their marketplace has grown rapidly across the US, India, LATAM, and Eastern Europe.

✅ Mercor’s Products & Services

Mercor offers a unified platform designed for fast-growing AI companies and tech teams.

1. AI Workforce Marketplace

A curated pool of engineers, annotators, and ML workers vetted through a proprietary AI-based assessment system.

Key features:

Verified global talent
Talent from India, US, Philippines, LATAM
Skill scoring using performance benchmarks
Project-to-project or long-term contracts

2. AI Training & Annotation Platform

Supports major AI labs with human-in-the-loop workflows.
This includes:

Dataset labeling
LLM alignment tasks
Reinforcement learning from human feedback (RLHF)
Safety evaluations
Model fine-tuning support

This service is directly comparable to Amazon Mechanical Turk and Scale AI, but more premium and quality-controlled.

3. Automated Recruitment Engine

Mercor uses algorithms to match companies with the right engineer based on:

Skills
Work history
Performance data
Salary expectations
Project needs

This drastically reduces time-to-hire.

✅ How Mercor Makes Money (Business Model)

Mercor operates on a commission & subscription hybrid:

Income Streams

✅ Percentage cut from hourly wages
✅ Enterprise subscription plans
✅ Placement fees
✅ AI training task revenue
✅ Workforce management tools

Top engineers on the platform report earning $40–$150 per hour, depending on specialization.

✅ Why Mercor’s Valuation Surged to $10 Billion

1. Explosive demand for AI talent

Global demand for AI engineers is outpacing supply.
Companies like OpenAI, Anthropic, Meta, Stripe, and AI research labs are aggressively hiring.

2. Human-in-the-loop (HITL) is a trillion-dollar backbone

Even the best LLMs require:

human supervision
human data training
continual evaluation

This market is expected to grow 30–40% CAGR through 2030.

3. Competitive edge similar to Scale AI

Mercor’s model resembles Scale AI, currently valued over $13–15B.

4. Strong traction in India

India is the largest pool of AI workforce talent.
Mercor’s Indian engineer ecosystem became a major global advantage.

5. Backed by top-tier investors

Goldman Sachs, Thiel Fellowship, and top VCs validated Mercor’s long-term potential.

✅ Market Size: AI Recruiting & HITL

Human-in-the-loop AI Market Size

Worth $2.5–$3 billion in 2024
Expected to reach $30–40 billion by 2030
Fueled by AI safety, alignment, model training, and compliance

AI Recruitment Market Size

Estimated $10.7 billion in 2025
Projected CAGR: 6%–8%
Driven by automation and global remote engineering talent

Global AI Talent Shortage

Estimated deficit: 4 million AI engineers by 2030
India supplies 16–25% of AI workforce for global companies

Mercor is positioned directly in this explosive demand curve.

✅ Mercor’s Funding History

Seed Funding (2023):

~$20 million from early-stage VCs
Thiel Fellowship support

Series A (2024):

$80–100 million (reported range)
Expanded operations in India and LATAM

Series B (Early 2025):

$70 million
Built proprietary AI recruitment engine

Series C (Late 2025):

$350 million led by Goldman Sachs Alternatives
Valuation: $10 billion

✅ Impact: Breaking Zuckerberg’s Record

Mark Zuckerberg became a billionaire at age 23 in 2008.
For 16+ years, no one broke that record.

Now:

✅ Brendan Foody — 22
✅ Adarsh Hiremath — 22
✅ Surya Midha — 22

These young founders now formally hold the title of the youngest self-made billionaires in the world.

✅ Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Who are the youngest self-made billionaires in the world?

As of 2025, the youngest self-made billionaires are the three Mercor co-founders, all aged 22.

What does Mercor do?

Mercor is an AI-powered recruiting and human-in-the-loop workforce platform that connects companies with engineers and AI training specialists globally.

How much funding has Mercor raised?

Mercor has raised over $500 million, with the latest round being $350 million at a $10B valuation.

Why is Mercor so valuable?

Because AI companies require human support for training, evaluating, and improving models. Mercor supplies this talent at scale.

Where are the founders from?

They are Bay Area high school classmates, with two being Indian-American.

Does Mercor hire engineers from India?

Yes. India is one of Mercor’s largest talent pools, with thousands of engineers and annotators.

Can individuals apply to Mercor?

Yes. Engineers, annotators, and ML workers can apply through Mercor’s website to join the vetted talent pool.

Will Mercor go public?

Analysts predict a potential IPO within 24–36 months given its rapid growth and valuation.

✅ Conclusion

The rise of Mercor is more than a success story—it represents a massive shift in the global AI economy.

Three 22-year-old founders have:

disrupted traditional hiring
built a global talent engine
become the youngest billionaires ever
reshaped how AI companies scale human support

Mercor’s journey shows one thing clearly:
In the AI era, the companies that combine human talent with smart automation will define the future.

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