April 27, 2026

Citizens of Silicon Valley – Arab origin, Ed. 2026

It’s April 2016 and we published our first ever newsletter.

It came with a few gifts – quite literally. We were giving away startup and VC books.

We also launched a small show portraying “Citizens of Silicon Valley” – following all those Arab founders, investors and geeks who moved there... but we only made it to Episode 4. Today, it would’ve probably been called a podcast ;)

So here we are – 10 years later, 93 issues later, more-grey-hair later... and certainly kicking the VC bucket harder than in 2016.

Thank you for sticking with us all these years and not getting fed up along the way… and we won’t complain if you decide to share this dinosaur of a newsletter with your friends, fellow founders, mentees, advisors… as well as your spouse or khalty.

Read it to your kids. You gotta start them early. Mine already prefer term sheets over bedtime stories. (I swear I didn’t force them.)

The US startup machine still runs heavily on immigrant ambition (note: ‘immigrant’ is meant in a neutral, factual sense; immigrant founders = entrepreneurs who relocate to another country and start companies there). As of 2026, immigrants have founded 55% of America’s billion-dollar startups – up from 51% a decade earlier. In AI, their share is even bigger: 65% of the top US AI companies were founded or co-founded by immigrants.

Roughly 1 in 4 immigrant founders of US unicorns first arrived as international students. So yes, visas, universities, and founder migration still matter more than a lot of people would like to admit.

And for the large‑cap version: in 2025, companies founded by immigrants or their children made up 46.2% of the Fortune 500, generating $8.6 trillion in revenue and employing 15.4 million people worldwide. Talk about the power of immigrants...And Arab Americans? There are ~350,000 of them living in California (0.9% of state population).

So who are the Arab founders building their way into the world’s most concentrated startup ecosystem? We called them Citizens of Silicon Valley back in 2016. Here is our 2026 edition.The list is not a top-10, not a ranking, and definitely not exhaustive. 10 SV names plus 2 extras that don’t quite fit the geography but are too relevant to ignore.

Citizens of Silicon Valley – Arab origin, Ed. 2026

Amjad Masad – Replit

A Jordanian-American with Palestinian origins who doesn’t really need an intro. In SV since at least 2013, worked at Facebook. Founded Replit in 2016; one of the defining AI coding platforms in the Bay Area ($9 billion val).
Othman Laraki — Color Health — grew up in Morocco, studied at Stanford & MIT, built his career in SV. Co-founded Color Health in 2015, fully focused on cancer care and population health ($4.6 billion val).

Amr Awadallah – Vectara

A deeply credible SV operator-founder with Egyptian origins. 30 years of experience. One of the clearest “Arab citizen of Silicon Valley” archetypes on our list. Co-founded Cloudera in 2008, got acquired in 2021 ($5.3 billion val). Co-founded Vectara in 2022: an Agent OS for trusted enterprise AI.

May Habib – Writer

Born in Lebanon, moved to San Francisco in 2016 from Dubai. Co-founder & CEO of Writer (2020), one of the highest-profile enterprise generative AI companies in SF ($1.9 billion val).

Waseem AlShikh – Writer

Born and raised in Syria. His US startup journey with May Habib goes back to Qordoba (2015), long before launching Writer (2020). Currently Writer’s co-founder and CTO ($1.9 billion val).

Ahmed Omar – Sully.ai

An MMA champion and healthcare AI pioneer with Egyptian origins. Built a total of 6 companies, including Odiggo (MENA). Co-founded Sully.ai in 2023: an autonomous OS for healthcare ($150 million val).

Ghita Houir Alami – ZeroEntropy

A 25-year-old UC Berkeley grad, originally from Morocco. An unusual tech background. Co-founded ZeroEntropy in 2024 to build retrieval infrastructure for AI systems. Emerged from stealth in 2025.

Khaled Hussein – Betterleap

Left Alexandria in 2005 and found his way to SV. A serial entrepreneur. Co-founded Tilt (acquired by Airbnb) and RedDoor (acquired by Opendoor). Co-founded Betterleap in 2020: an AI healthcare recruiting agent.

Elie Khoury – BikeIQ

An LAU grad and a classic Lebanese-SF founder story. Co-founded Woopra in Lebanon (2008), moved it to SV some years later, got acquired by Appier (2022). Founded BikeIQ in 2023: “the iPhone reimagined as a bike computer”.

Abdallah Absi – Village

A Lebanese entrepreneur born in Kuwait. One of the genuinely cross-border Arab-founder stories. Founded multiple companies, incl. Zoomaal (2012; Lebanon). Moved to SF and co-founded GivingLoop (2016; sustainability for non-profits) and Village (2021; the network layer for AI agents).

+2 non-SV:

Tarek Mansour – Kalshi

Born in California, grew up in Lebanon, attended MIT. Co-founded Kalshi with Luana Lopes Lara in 2018: a regulated prediction market and a major current startup story ($22 billion val). More New York than SV in day-to-day geography.

Will Ahmed – WHOOP

An American founder with Egyptian roots. Launched WHOOP in 2012: a major wearable tech ($10 billion val). Now heavily expanding into the GCC via an international R&D facility. Boston-based but still deserves to be listed.

Note: Valuations reflect the latest public data. If none is listed, it means we couldn’t source it.

CC: Amjad Masad, Othman Laraki, Amr Awadallah, May Habib, Waseem AlShikh, Ahmed Omar, Ghita Houir Alami, Khaled Hussein, Elie Khoury, Abdallah Absi, Tarek Mansour, Will Ahmed

We can only wonder what this list will look like in 10 years. Given that the tech industry is once again becoming more centralized in SV thanks to AI (vs. decentralization during/post-Covid), we are witnessing a new round of talent clustering, company clustering, and capital clustering in Northern California.

So – how much bigger can the Arab share of that talent pool become?Look out for our April 2036 issue ;)

TL;DR

Silicon Valley still runs heavily on immigrant ambition and Arab founders are very much part of that story. This issue rounds up 10 Arab-origin founders building in SV, plus 2 non-SV names too relevant to ignore, incl. Replit, Writer, Color Health, Vectara, and WHOOP. As AI re‑centralizes talent, capital, and company‑building back into Northern California, the real question is how much larger Arab‑origin founders’ share could grow over the next decade.

See you next month,

Hasan

Family Postcard