More than half of the startups named on Forbes' newest 500-company list of the "Best Startup Employers" in America are based in the Bay Area.
While Massachusetts companies took the top two spots, the highest-ranking Bay Area startup was San Francisco-based Span.io, a designer of renewable energy storage systems for residential customers, which took the No. 5 spot.
Span.io was founded in 2018 by CEO Arch Rao. The company has raised nearly $220 million and was most recently valued at $500 million, according to PitchBook. Its investors include Shell's Gamechanger accelerator, Amazon's Alexa Fund, Climate Capital, Wells Fargo's Innovation Incubator, Congruent Ventures, HCVC and Ulu Ventures.
San Francisco-based OpenAI also landed on the list at No. 192. The artificial intelligence company has been making lots of headlines recently. On Tuesday, Salesforce announced that it was partnering with OpenAI to integrate its generative AI chatbot, ChatGPT, into its CRM products. On Friday, LinkedIn founder and longtime OpenAI backer Reid Hoffman announced that he would step down from OpenAI's board. And on Thursday, Fast Company named OpenAI the most innovative company of the year.
To compile this year's list, Forbes consulted with German research company Statista and evaluated 2,600 companies with at least 50 employees based in the U.S., with criteria including employer reputation, employee satisfaction and growth.
Overall, the industries most represented were business and software services, finance, healthcare and general technology.
Here are the Bay Area startups that landed in the top 100 on Forbes' list of "America’s Best Startup Employers" in 2023, with their rank and city:
- #5 Span.io (S.F.)
- #6 Postscript (S.F.)
- #7 Cribl (S.F.)
- #9 Plus (Santa Clara)
- #10 Mission Lane (S.F.)
- #11 CyberCube (S.F.)
- #14 Remote (S.F.)
- #18 Snappr (S.F.)
- #21 Sonatus (Sunnyvale)
- #22 Abnormal Security (S.F.)
- #27 Creative Force (S.F.)
- #29 Nozomi Networks (S.F.)
- #30 Weights & Biases (S.F.)
- #34 Braintrust (S.F.)
- #36 Noname Security (San Jose)
- #37 AiDash (San Jose)
- #39 Kairos Power (Alameda)
- #43 Terminal (S.F.)
- #46 Voltus (S.F.)
- #50 Element5 (San Jose)
- #52 VergeSense (S.F.)
- #54 Lunar Energy (Mountain View)
- #55 Curated (S.F.)
- #57 SiMa.ai (San Jose)
- #58 Privacera (Fremont)
- #59 Monarch Tractor (Livermore)
- #60 Gem (S.F.)
- #62 Front (S.F.)
- #63 Sibros (San Jose)
- #64 Pachama (S.F.)
- #66 Metagenomi (Emeryville)
- #67 Contentstack (S.F.)
- #68 Woebot Health (S.F.)
- #70 Mattermost (Palo Alto)
- #71 Transcarent (S.F.)
- #72 Observe (San Mateo)
- #73 Moveworks (Mountain View)
- #74 Persona (S.F.)
- #75 Luminous Computing (Mountain View)
- #80 SaltSecurity (Palo Alto)
- #81 Deel (S.F.)
- #83 Secureframe (S.F.)
- #84 LambdaTest (S.F.)
- #86 Pilot (S.F.)
- #88 Productiv (Palo Alto)
- #89 Step (Palo Alto)
- #92 Zippin (S.F.)
- #95 Tecton (S.F.)
- #97 Odetta (S.F.)
- #100 Enable (S.F.)
Other notable Bay Area startups on the list include:
- #177 Nuro (Mountain View)
- #188 Brex (S.F.)
- #224 Kobold (Berkeley)
- #234 Otter.ai (S.F.)
- #263 Alt (S.F.)
- #271 Sensor Tower (S.F.)
- #295 Rippling (S.F.)
- #296 ThirdLove (S.F.)
- #324 Patreon (S.F.)
- #361 Substack (S.F.)
- #370 Osso VR (S.F.)
- #371 Databricks (S.F.)
- #380 Plaid (S.F.)
- #381 Standard Cognition (S.F.)
- #396 Twelve (Berkeley)
- #430 Cowbell Cyber (S.F.)
- #435 FalconX (San Mateo)
- #437 CloudTrucks (S.F.)
- #444 Jane Technologies (Santa Cruz)
- #464 Wonolo (S.F.)
- #470 Bear Robotics (Redwood City)
