Fireworks AI

High-performance generative AI inference platform — 10 trillion tokens/day, $4B valuation, founded by PyTorch engineers.

AI Training AI Inference Platform / Generative AI Infrastructure
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Redwood City, CA, USA HQ
221 employees
2022 founded

What is Fireworks AI?

Fireworks AI is a generative-AI inference platform founded in 2022 in Redwood City, California by a team of ex-Meta PyTorch engineers — CEO Lin Qiao led PyTorch at Meta and was joined by co-founders Dmytro Dzhulgakov, Pawel Garbacki, Benny Chen, James Reed, Dmytro Ivchenko, and Chenyu Zhao. The platform offers fast, cost-effective, scalable hosted inference for the most popular open-source and customer-tuned models (Llama, Mixtral, DeepSeek, FLUX, Whisper, plus fine-tuned variants), and a serverless function-calling stack for AI agent builders. Customers include Cursor, Notion, Quora, Doordash, and other AI-native companies running production workloads. The company raised a $52M Series B led by Sequoia in 2024 at a $552M valuation, then a Series C round in October 2025 at $4B valuation; in early 2026 it was reported in talks for a new round at ~$15B. Total raised stands at ~$307M from Sequoia, Nvidia, Benchmark, Greenoaks, and Databricks Ventures. Annualized revenue hit $315M in February 2026 (up 416% YoY) with the platform processing 10+ trillion tokens per day.

Mission & values

Make the world's best open and custom generative-AI models fast, cheap, and accessible to every product team — from prototype to 10-trillion-token-per-day production.

Qualifications

Fireworks AI hires across ML systems engineering (CUDA / kernel optimization, distributed inference, model parallelism), platform engineering (serving infra, observability, billing), product engineering (frontend, API, developer experience), research (post-training, inference optimization), GTM (developer relations, sales engineering, AE, customer success), and finance/people. The team is hybrid-first with a strong Redwood City headquarters concentration; most engineering roles are open to remote-eligible US candidates with periodic in-person collaboration weeks. Compensation is high — Series C frontier-AI infra bands — with meaningful pre-IPO equity. Apply via fireworks.ai/careers.

Leadership

L

Lin Qiao

Co-Founder & CEO

Co-founded Fireworks in 2022; previously led the PyTorch organization at Meta. Sits on the PyTorch Foundation board.

D

Dmytro Dzhulgakov

Co-Founder & CTO

Co-founded Fireworks in 2022; long-time PyTorch core engineer at Meta.

P

Pawel Garbacki

Co-Founder

Co-founded Fireworks in 2022; ex-Meta PyTorch infrastructure.

B

Benny Chen

Co-Founder

Co-founded Fireworks in 2022; ex-Meta PyTorch engineer.

J

James Reed

Co-Founder

Co-founded Fireworks in 2022; ex-Meta PyTorch engineer.

D

Dmytro Ivchenko

Co-Founder

Co-founded Fireworks in 2022; ex-Meta PyTorch engineer.

C

Chenyu Zhao

Co-Founder

Co-founded Fireworks in 2022; ex-Meta PyTorch engineer.

Hiring process

  1. 1

    Apply via fireworks.ai/careers

    Browse open roles and submit your application + resume.

  2. 2

    Recruiter screen

    Initial conversation to confirm fit, comp expectations, and US-remote vs hybrid alignment.

    About 3 days

  3. 3

    Hiring manager interview

    Role-specific deep-dive — past projects, technical depth, why-Fireworks.

    About 5 days

  4. 4

    Technical loop

    Multi-round technical interviews — coding, system design, ML systems / CUDA depth for inference engineering roles.

    About 7 days

  5. 5

    Founder + offer

    Final round with a founder or executive, then offer + comp + equity discussion.

    About 5 days

Funding

StageSeries C+
Investors
Sequoia Capital Nvidia Benchmark Greenoaks Capital Databricks Ventures AIX Ventures Conviction Partners

Awards & recognition

  • $4B valuation Series C · 2025

    Fireworks AI

  • 10+ trillion tokens/day platform scale · 2026

    Fireworks AI

  • $315M annualized revenue (up 416% YoY) · 2026

    Fireworks AI

  • Backed by Sequoia + Nvidia + Benchmark · 2024

    Fireworks AI

Company information

Frequently asked questions

Who founded Fireworks AI?
CEO Lin Qiao plus six co-founders — Dmytro Dzhulgakov, Pawel Garbacki, Benny Chen, James Reed, Dmytro Ivchenko, and Chenyu Zhao — all ex-Meta PyTorch engineers. Founded 2022.
What does Fireworks AI do?
Hosted generative-AI inference platform — fast, cost-effective serving for open-source and fine-tuned models (Llama, Mixtral, DeepSeek, FLUX, Whisper, etc.) plus a function-calling stack for agents.
Who are Fireworks customers?
AI-native product companies including Cursor, Notion, Quora, Doordash, plus thousands of developers using the API tier.
What is the latest valuation?
$4B at the Series C in October 2025. The company was reported in talks for a new round at ~$15B in early 2026.
Where are roles based?
Redwood City, California headquarters with hybrid-first culture. Most engineering roles are open to US-remote candidates with periodic in-person collaboration weeks.
How big is the team?
~221 employees as of May 2026.
How can I apply?
Browse open roles and apply at fireworks.ai/careers.

Stay in the loop.

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