Peter Thiel

Co-Founder & Partner at Founders Fund · Joined 2005

Biography

Peter Thiel co-founded PayPal and led it through its 2002 IPO and subsequent $1.5 billion acquisition by eBay, then became Facebook's first outside investor in 2004 - a bet that returned enormously when the company went public in 2012. In 2005, alongside fellow PayPal alumni Ken Howery and Luke Nosek, he co-founded Founders Fund on a deliberately contrarian philosophy: back ambitious, technically difficult companies other investors pass on. That thesis led the firm to become the first institutional investor in both SpaceX and Palantir, the data-analytics company Thiel co-founded and still chairs. Palantir went public in 2020; SpaceX followed in 2026.

Education

B.A. Philosophy, Stanford University (1989)
J.D., Stanford Law School (1992)

Previous Experience

Co-Founder & CEO, PayPal (1998–2002) - IPO 2002, acquired by eBay for $1.5B
Founder, Clarium Capital Management (2002)
Co-Founder & Chairman, Palantir Technologies (2003) - IPO 2020

Notable Investments

Facebook METASpaceX SPCXPalantir PLTRLinkedInAirbnb ABNBStripePayPalYelp

Board Seats

Palantir (Chairman)

Career Timeline

1998

Co-founds PayPal, serving as CEO and chairman.

2002

PayPal goes public, then is acquired by eBay for $1.5 billion months later.

2003

Co-founds Palantir Technologies, serving as chairman.

2004

Makes the first outside investment in Facebook.

2005

Co-founds Founders Fund with fellow PayPal alumni Ken Howery and Luke Nosek.

2008

Founders Fund becomes an early investor in SpaceX.

2020

Palantir goes public on the NYSE via direct listing.

Sources & References

Founders Fund - Peter Thiel ↗Britannica ↗Wikipedia ↗