Googlers who quit to form their own companies do get more venture funding than founders from other big tech companies.
That's according to research from online recruiting startup TopProspect, which has job data about more than three million tech workers (mostly in Silicon Valley) drawn from sources like LinkedIn and Facebook.
TopProspect took a look at startups founded in the last five years with publicly available funding information, and more than 10 employees in TopProspect's peer-recommended network (which shows they're a decent size and well-connected).
It found that ex-Yahoos have started the most companies in this category -- 15 total. But those companies have only received about $126 million in funding.
The 13 companies started by former Google employees, including Foursquare, Tapjoy, and Color, have raised almost $310 million in venture funding.
One reason is there are quite a few Silicon Valley angels and investors who also came from the company, like Chris Sacca, Aydin Senkut, and Paul Buccheit (who joined Y Combinator last year). It might also help that Google is the most acquisitive of the big tech companies right now -- and occasionally buys back its own spawn, like it did with Aardvark.
TopProspect also found that former Microsoft employees fared well with venture money (14 founders raised $189 million). Companies started by Facebook founders are hot on buzz -- Path, Asana, and Quora were all founded by ex-Facebookers -- but there are only 7 of them and they're still relatively young, so haven't gotten as much money yet -- only about $65 million.
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