Howie Liu
Unicorn founderCo-Founder and CEO at Airtable · Founder at Etacts
San Francisco, California
Writes $5K – $50K checks · typically $25K
FoundedAirtable$11.7BEtacts · YC
Find your path to Howie
197 people in our graph share verified history with Howie — schools, employers, funds. One of them is your warm intro.
About
Howie Liu is the co-founder and CEO of Airtable, the no-code app platform that reached an $11.7 billion valuation in 2021 and agreed to sell to Bending Spoons for about $2.25 billion in equity value in August 2026. The son of Korean immigrant parents in College Station, Texas, he taught himself C++ at 13, entered Duke at 16, and sold his first startup, Etacts, to Salesforce within a year of founding it. He started Airtable in 2012 with fellow Duke alumni Andrew Ofstad and Emmett Nicholas to consumerize the relational database — growing it to 500,000+ organizations and 80% of the Fortune 100, and 'refounding' it as an AI-native platform in 2025.
Deal analysis
- Airtable × Bending Spoons: who got the money home
An estimated liquidation waterfall: the late-stage pref stack took $1.29bn at ~1x, founders took ~$190m, and seed money made ~42x.
Read the analysis →
Beyond investing
- Founded
- Co-founded the CRM startup Etacts in February 2010 and sold it to Salesforce about nine months later, then worked as a Salesforce product manager on social CRM.
- Education
- Duke University, mechanical engineering and public policy.
- Family
- Born in College Station, Texas to Korean immigrant parents; his father earned a biochemistry PhD at Texas A&M.
- More
- Relaunched Airtable as an AI-native platform in June 2025 — calling it a 'refounding' — and describes himself as an IC CEO who codes daily and is Airtable's heaviest AI inference user. Agreed to sell Airtable to Bending Spoons in August 2026 — $1.285B enterprise value, roughly $2.25B in equity value counting Airtable's ~$965M net cash.
Mentioned above: the Duke University mafia → · the Salesforce mafia → · the Airtable mafia →
From published sources — common ground for a warm intro.
Co-Founder and CEO at Airtable
Intro paths
In turn, Howie can intro founders to Airtable's investors below.
Airtable's investors · 32
Co-founders at Airtable
Founder at EtactsYC W10
Intro paths
Howie went through Y Combinator (Winter 2010) — any YC alum in your network can reach them through the YC community.
In turn, Howie can intro founders to Etacts's investors below.
Etacts's investors · 2
Co-founders at Etacts
Experience
- AirtableCofounder, CEOcurrent2013 — present
- SalesforceProducts2011 — 2012
- EtactsCofounder2010 — 2011San Francisco
- Duke UniversityComputational Airfoil Design2008 — 2009
Podcasts & interviews
featuring Howie LiuHowie Liu: Decoding Airtable's $11B Valuation; The Impending AI Revolution in Enterprise | E1053
20VC with Harry Stebbings
How we restructured Airtable's entire org for AI | Howie Liu (co-founder and CEO)
Lenny's Podcast
Airtable’s AI Reboot with CEO Howie Liu
Kleiner Perkins
How Airtable Is Letting Anyone Build With AI with CEO Howie Liu
Superhuman AI: Decoding the Future Podcast
Howie Liu, Airtable CEO: A Fortt Knox Update
Fortt Knox · youtube.com
Airtable Co-Founder & CEO Howie Liu talks Creating the Connected Enterprise at CNBC Work Summit
CNBC Events
Network3
Investors connected to Howie in public investor directories — a warm-intro map.
Frequently asked questions
- Who is Howie Liu?
- Howie Liu is the co-founder and CEO of Airtable, the no-code app platform that reached an $11.7 billion valuation in 2021 and agreed to sell to Bending Spoons for about $2.25 billion in equity value in August 2026. The son of Korean immigrant parents in College Station, Texas, he taught himself C++ at 13, entered Duke at 16, and sold his first startup, Etacts, to Salesforce within a year of founding it. He started Airtable in 2012 with fellow Duke alumni Andrew Ofstad and Emmett Nicholas to consumerize the relational database — growing it to 500,000+ organizations and 80% of the Fortune 100, and 'refounding' it as an AI-native platform in 2025.
- Where does Howie Liu work?
- Howie Liu is Co-Founder and CEO of Airtable and Founder at Etacts.
- What check size does Howie Liu write?
- Howie Liu typically writes checks of $5K – $50K.
- What companies did Howie Liu found?
- Howie Liu founded Airtable, Etacts.
- Where did Howie Liu go to school?
- Howie Liu studied at Duke University (Mechanical Engineering, Public Policy).
- What podcasts and interviews feature Howie Liu?
- Tracked appearances include "Howie Liu: Decoding Airtable's $11B Valuation; The Impending AI Revolution in Enterprise | E1053", "How we restructured Airtable's entire org for AI | Howie Liu (co-founder and CEO)", "Airtable’s AI Reboot with CEO Howie Liu", and 3 more.
Founder mafias
Y Combinator mafia10,230
Also came through, then founded or led a company.
+ 10,223 more
Duke University mafia288
Also came through, then founded or led a company.
+ 281 more
Salesforce mafia175
Also came through, then founded or led a company.
+ 168 more
Airtable mafia12
Also came through, then founded or led a company.
+ 5 more
Etacts mafia2
Also came through, then founded or led a company.
Same school
Also attended Duke University954
+ 948 more
Shared employers
Also worked at Airtable37
+ 31 more
Also worked at Salesforce446
+ 440 more
Also worked at Etacts1
Also worked at Duke University188
+ 182 more