Where does John Coogan work?

John Coogan is Founder of Lucy Goods, Inc and Co-Founder & Host at TBPN and Founder/CTO at Soylent.

What companies did John Coogan found?

John Coogan founded Lucy Goods, Inc, Soylent, TBPN.

What has John Coogan written?

John Coogan has 1 tracked post on johncoogan.com, including "The Metaverse: Is It Already Here?".

John Coogan

Founder

Co-Founder & Host at TBPN · Founder at Lucy Goods, Inc · Founder/CTO at Soylent

Los Angeles, California, United States

FoundedLucy Goods, Inc · YC Soylent · YC TBPN

About

John Coogan co-founded TBPN, the daily tech talk show OpenAI bought in April 2026 in its first acquisition of a media company — terms were undisclosed, with the Financial Times putting the price in the low hundreds of millions. He had already co-founded two consumer companies: Soylent, where he was co-founder and CTO from 2013 to 2017 and helped scale the meal-replacement brand from a one-bedroom San Francisco apartment into a 50-person business doing nine figures of revenue, and Lucy, the tobacco-free nicotine brand he started in 2016 with Soylent colleagues David Renteln and Samy Hamdouche and took through Y Combinator. Between them he spent 2023 to 2025 as an entrepreneur in residence at Founders Fund and built a 450,000-subscriber YouTube channel telling technology stories, a format he turned into a live daily show with Jordi Hays in October 2024.

Beyond investing

Founded: Co-founded Soylent, described as the biggest crowdfunded food product ever. Co-founded Lucy, a company offering a safer nicotine alternative. Co-founded TBPN with Jordi Hays; the first episode published on October 4, 2024 under the show's original name, the Technology Brothers podcast, and it became a three-hour weekday live stream after rebranding to TBPN in 2025. Co-founded Soylent in 2013 with David Renteln, Rob Rhinehart and Matt Cauble and served as CTO until 2017, scaling it from a one-bedroom San Francisco apartment to roughly 50 people and nine figures of revenue. Starco Brands acquired Soylent in February 2023, years after he left. Co-founded Lucy in 2016 with David Renteln and Samy Hamdouche and serves as CMO; the tobacco-free nicotine company went through Y Combinator's W18 batch and raised a $10M Series A led by RRE Ventures in 2020.
Hobbies: Enjoys appearing on podcasts and has a personal rule of never turning down a legitimate podcast invitation.
More: OpenAI acquired TBPN on April 2, 2026 — its first media-company acquisition. The show sits inside OpenAI's Strategy org under Chris Lehane, and the agreement explicitly protects TBPN's editorial independence over programming and guest booking. His first startup, begun straight out of college with David Renteln, raised $17,000 and shut down after about six months. Entrepreneur in residence at Founders Fund from 2023 to 2025; he has said the first deal he saw in motion after joining was the firm's post-ChatGPT round in OpenAI in late 2022. Has worked with Sam Altman for over a decade: Altman funded his first company in 2013, was Y Combinator's president when Lucy went through the accelerator, and was the first frontier-lab chief to appear on TBPN. Runs the JohnCooganPlus YouTube channel, about 453,000 subscribers of long-form technology storytelling, and writes at johncoogan.com.

Mentioned above: the Y Combinator mafia → · the Founders Fund mafia →

From John's own website — common ground for a warm intro.

Co-Founder & Host at TBPN

Co-founders at TBPN

Jordi HaysCo-Founder & Host

Founder at Lucy Goods, Inc YC W18

Intro paths

John went through Y Combinator (Winter 2018) — any YC alum in your network can reach them through the YC community.

→

In turn, John can intro founders to Lucy Goods, Inc's investors below.

Lucy Goods, Inc's investors · 6

GreycroftNew York · $100K – $5M checks Greycroft PartnersNew York Refactor CapitalBurlingame · $1M – $2M checks RRE VenturesNew York · $5M – $15M checks Vice VenturesNew York Y CombinatorSan Francisco · $500K checks · since 2018

Co-founders at Lucy Goods, Inc

Samy HamdoucheFounder

David RentelnFounder

Founder/CTO at Soylent YC S12

Intro paths

John went through Y Combinator (Summer 2012) — any YC alum in your network can reach them through the YC community.

→

In turn, John can intro founders to Soylent's investors below.

Soylent's investors · 5

Andreessen HorowitzMenlo Park · $500K – $50M checks Balaji Srinivasan$10K – $500K checks GV (Google Ventures)Mountain View · $250K – $50M checks Index VenturesSan Francisco · $540K – $10.8M checks Y CombinatorSan Francisco · $500K checks · since 2012

Co-founders at Soylent

Rob RhinehartFounder/CEO

Hunter ScottFounder

Kumar TFounder

Matt CaubleFounder/COO

Experience

TBPNCo-Foundercurrent2025 — present
LucyCo-Foundercurrent2016 — present
Founders FundEIR2023 — 2025
SoylentCo-Founder2012 — 2017

Podcasts & interviews

featuring John Coogan

Brainstorming +$1M Business Ideas With Soylent's Co-Founder | ft. John Coogan (#496)

My First Million

Cursor Acquisition Closes, Bezos x Liverpool, Flying Roadster, Car Week, Gen Z Trends

John Coogan

SaaSpocalypse Revisited, DeepMind's Plan, Polestar Collapse, Aman vs Ryan Walker

John Coogan

Kushner and Iger are Buying The Lakers, Grok 4.6, AI Watermarks, Nuclear Jellyfish

John Coogan

Half a Trilly, AI Text Watermarks, Paramount Threatens to Bounce, Leo Defends Chilean Frogs

John Coogan

Zuck's AI Future, PE Boyfriends, AI Hacks Gym, SpaceX Moons

John Coogan

6 more appearances

Writing

All posts ↗

The Metaverse: Is It Already Here?2021-11-15

Coogan argues the metaverse describes a future era, not a current product, and tries to predict when digital life will become more meaningful than the physical world.summary...defining the metaverse and timing its arrival.

Frequently asked questions

Who is John Coogan?: John Coogan co-founded TBPN, the daily tech talk show OpenAI bought in April 2026 in its first acquisition of a media company — terms were undisclosed, with the Financial Times putting the price in the low hundreds of millions. He had already co-founded two consumer companies: Soylent, where he was co-founder and CTO from 2013 to 2017 and helped scale the meal-replacement brand from a one-bedroom San Francisco apartment into a 50-person business doing nine figures of revenue, and Lucy, the tobacco-free nicotine brand he started in 2016 with Soylent colleagues David Renteln and Samy Hamdouche and took through Y Combinator. Between them he spent 2023 to 2025 as an entrepreneur in residence at Founders Fund and built a 450,000-subscriber YouTube channel telling technology stories, a format he turned into a live daily show with Jordi Hays in October 2024.
Where does John Coogan work?: John Coogan is Founder of Lucy Goods, Inc and Co-Founder & Host at TBPN and Founder/CTO at Soylent.
What companies did John Coogan found?: John Coogan founded Lucy Goods, Inc, Soylent, TBPN.
What has John Coogan written?: John Coogan has 1 tracked post on johncoogan.com, including "The Metaverse: Is It Already Here?".
What podcasts and interviews feature John Coogan?: Tracked appearances include "Brainstorming +$1M Business Ideas With Soylent's Co-Founder | ft. John Coogan (#496)", "Cursor Acquisition Closes, Bezos x Liverpool, Flying Roadster, Car Week, Gen Z Trends", "SaaSpocalypse Revisited, DeepMind's Plan, Polestar Collapse, Aman vs Ryan Walker", and 9 more.