Darwin
YC F25San Francisco, US · Founded 2025 · 3 employees · Hiring · 4 known investors
Find your way into Darwin
1,445 people in our graph share verified history with the Darwin team — schools, employers, funds. One of them is your warm intro.
Paul Kwanunlockedknows Sergio Charles · together at Stanford University (overlapped)
×4knows the team · via University of Oxford
×3knows the team · via Stanford University
knows the team · via Franklin Templeton
knows the team · via Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (SAIL)
knows the team · via Columbia University
Thesis is an AI research lab that automates AI research and development through autonomous experimentation. It applies recursive self-improvement machine learning to problems in biology and materials science.
Also known as Thesis · Thesis Labs
Advanced ManufacturingAI & Machine LearningDeep TechEnterprise SoftwareRoboticsArtificial IntelligenceHard TechMachine LearningUnited States of AmericaAmerica / Canada
Founders & leadership· Y Combinator alumni (F25)
Darwin was founded in 2025 by Sergio Charles and Luigi Charles.
SC
Sergio Charlesin𝕏Co-Founder & CEOSergio Charles has conducted AI research at Google X, Nvidia, and Stanford's AI Lab. He holds a B.S. in Mathematics and Computer Science and an M.S. in Statistics from Stanford.
LC
Luigi CharlesinCo-Founder & CTOLuigi Charles is a second-time founder with a Columbia computer science and mathematics degree. He previously built and scaled payments infrastructure focused on stablecoins to handle multi-billion dollar transaction volumes.
Investors · 4
Funding
SEC filings, press & company announcements$45M disclosed across 1 of 2 rounds · 2021–2026
- $45MSeries AApr 2026
Oak HC/FT (lead), Black Opal Ventures, CRV
Source ↗ - Undisclosed amountSeries AJul 2021Source ↗
Source: company announcements and press reports — follow each round's link for the claim.
The YC application· Fall 2025 batch
Alumni Q&A
- How did your company get started? (i.e., How did the founders meet? How did you come up with the idea? How did you decide to be a founder?)
- The founders are brothers who grew up in the Caribbean and have built projects together throughout their lives. Sergio taught himself calculus from MIT OpenCourseWare at 12, published mathematics as a teenager, and worked on AI and robotics at Stanford, Nvidia, and Google X; Luigi studied math and CS at Columbia and co-founded a payments company where he scaled engineering to billions in transaction volume.
- What is your long-term vision? If you truly succeed, what will be different about the world?
- The founders aim to build embodied artificial general intelligence, moving AI beyond screen-based problem solving into the physical world. They envision billions of robots working alongside humans to perform useful work.
Summarized from the founders' answers on their Y Combinator profile.
Images
Competitors · 2
by search overlap
Thesis10 shared keywordsThesis is a Bitcoin venture studio that funds and builds decentralized products and protocols focused on personal empowerment.
Antithesis9 shared keywordsAntithesis provides deterministic simulation testing software that automatically finds and reproduces bugs in mission-critical software systems. The platform helps engineering teams in tech companies reduce production defects and accelerate development cycles for distributed systems and complex software.
Companies competing with Darwin for the same Google search keywords, organic and paid, via search-intersection analysis.
In the news
Frequently asked questions
- What does Darwin do?
- Thesis is an AI research lab that automates AI research and development through autonomous experimentation. It applies recursive self-improvement machine learning to problems in biology and materials science.
- Who founded Darwin?
- Darwin was founded by Sergio Charles, Luigi Charles in 2025.
- Who are Darwin's investors?
- Darwin's investors include Y Combinator, Black Opal Ventures, CRV (Charles River Ventures), Oak HC/FT.
- How much funding has Darwin raised?
- Darwin has disclosed $45M raised across 1 of its 2 known rounds.
- Where is Darwin headquartered?
- Darwin is headquartered in San Francisco, US.