A single Indian engineer secretly worked at 10+ YC startups simultaneously since 2022. Exposed July 2025. The cleanest receipt of how thin Tan-era YC due-diligence has become.
Soham Parekh ghosted work, faked chronic-illness excuses, and collected paychecks from at least ten YC-backed startups in parallel. Exposed July 2 2025 by Suhail Doshi (Playground AI) on X. confirmed YC affiliations include Leaping AI (W25), FuseAI (W25), Antimetal (Tan-era), Sync Labs — Parekh appeared in their team promo video while denying he worked there — plus several more that fired him on discovery of parallel employment . Parekh later admitted on the TBPN podcast that he'd been doing this since 2022. The pattern reveals: (a) reference checks aren't being done across YC's own batches, (b) hiring under demo-day-driven urgency overrides standard diligence, and (c) the same engineer can pass the YC interview process at a company-by-company level multiple times. Not a fraud against YC investors — a fraud against ten different YC-funded engineering teams.
Satirical project. Not affiliated with Y Combinator. All information from public records.