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Linear — Startup ProfileIssue tracking and project management built for high-performance teams — now $1.25BHQ: San Francisco, CA (remote-first) | Founded: 2019 | Employees: ~100 (2025) | Stage: Series C ($1.25B valuation) | Website: https://linear.appAboutLinear was founded in 2019 by Karri Saarinen (CEO, previously design lead at Airbnb and Coinbase), Jori Lallo (CTO, ex-Coinbase, Uber) and Tuomas Artman (ex-Coinbase, Unity). It is a purpose-built issue tracking and project management tool for modern product teams — an opinionated, fast alternative to Jira and Asana. The company is remote-first (SF/NY/EU) and famously profitable and product-led, with next-to-no marketing spend. CEO Karri Saarinen's 2025 letter 'Building our way' announced an $82M Series C at a $1.25B valuation with primary and secondary funding, emphasizing craft and independence over hypergrowth. Linear serves thousands of startups and scaleups including Stripe, OpenAI, Perplexity and Vercel.Key Metrics

Valuation: $1.25B (Jun 2025)

Last Round: $82M Series C

Total Funding: $135.3M (per Startup Intros)

Founded: 2019

Headcount: ~100

Magic metric: $12.5M per employee

Funding Rounds

Round: $4.2M (est.) (2020-03) — Sequoia Capital

Round: $20M (est.) (2021-06) — Accel

Round: $30M (est.) (2022-09) — Accel, 01A

Round: $82M (2025-06-10) — Accel, 01A, Sequoia (follow-on)

Key People

Karri Saarinen

Jori Lallo

Tuomas Artman

Key Competitors

Atlassian Jira —

Asana —

Monday.com / ClickUp —

Shortcut (Clubhouse) / Height / Plane —

Timeline Highlights

2025-12: 'Issue tracking is dead' AI pivot

2025-06-10: $82M Series C at $1.25B — 'Building our way'

2022-09: Series B at $400M

2020: Seed from Sequoia

2019: Founded