When you think of California and tech, Silicon Valley or the Bay Area might be the first places that come to mind. But Los Angeles should, too.
LA is the third-largest startup market in the U.S. with roughly 3,800 venture-backed startups in the region according to venture capital firm Telstra Ventures. And when looking at both startups and established companies, LA has the fourth-most job postings so far this year. A CompTIA analysis found LA-based companies posted 68,653 open positions through April, a 41 percent increase from the 48,849 jobs posted during the same period in 2021.
Some of those positions can be found at Invoca, Linktree, Cloudvirga and eight other companies. They’re attracting and retaining top talent with professional development opportunities, innovative projects and in-demand perks.
Modern Animal is a 24/7 veterinary care platform that allows pet owners to consult with vets via an app.
Why Zhang stays: “The number one reason I’ve stayed is the passionate and compassionate people I work with. Specifically, it’s my stand-out manager and close peers who I genuinely like, am able to learn from every day, and who have sunk so much time and energy into seeing the company’s mission through.
A few months into my role, I felt that I was struggling with the learning curve. When I flagged my struggles to my manager, she immediately began to spend time daily with me. With that support, I saw the quality of my own work shoot up exponentially and felt 10 times more connected to her and the company. That was a turning point for me — when I truly saw how fast I’d be able to grow working with her and when I began to really appreciate her management style.”
Favorite perk: “I love the flexibility that we have as a company to set our own days in the office versus when we work from home. It’s something that we obviously saw as the expectation during the height of Covid-19, but now that more companies are going into offices, I no longer take that flexibility for granted. In my mind, it shows the steady trust that our leaders have in us to be working at our fullest and to know our close partners. It also does a lot to maintain the small startup feel that the company had when we first started.”
Cloudvirga offers a digital SaaS platform that engages customers, empowers originators and aims to remove friction from the home loan process.
Why Nelson joined: “The key driver for me was to expand my skill set and develop my career in the mortgage industry. I have a loan officer and sales trainer background, and stepping into account management was the next step for me. As a former loan officer, I’m familiar with the pain points that come with inefficient systems, poor workflows and dated processes. Cloudvirga solves them all within one platform. I’m excited about our products and our ability to capture more market share as we continue onboarding additional branches from our current clients and solidifying new relationships across the industry.”
Improving the borrower experience: “The coolest project I’m working on is our Third Party Originator (TPO) project, hands down! I believe this is a game changer for the wholesale mortgage market. Everyone has gone digital to increase efficiencies and turn-times and ultimately improve the loan officer and borrower experience. We accomplish this by integrating our consumer portal (cPOS) and originator portal (oPOS) to provide a seamless loan origination system. From cPOS, borrowers can complete their application, order credit reports and upload their documentation within minutes and pass the baton to the TPO. Inside oPOS, the TPO can price, lock, verify income and assets, run an automated underwriting system, request disclosures and much more, all inside our platform.”
Linktree enables creators to streamline their online identity and monetize their following.
Why McDaniel joined: “When I was looking for the next step in my career, I was focused on finding a company where I could learn and grow, both personally and professionally, while having the opportunity to produce exciting and innovative marketing campaigns. Throughout my time interviewing with the Linktree team, it was clear this is an environment that encourages individuals to foster their creativity in every single thing they do. Since I’ve joined, that has been so evident across my entire scope of work. We’re constantly encouraged to think outside of the box and collaborate with each other on ideas we believe will really drive impact for the company. I feel so fortunate to have joined Linktree and to be building a team at a company that prioritizes personal and professional growth, encourages employees to bring their whole selves to work, and creates a space where creativity is welcomed and encouraged.”
Connecting creators: “We’re currently in the process of designing our first-ever in-person experiential activation at VidCon, where the world’s leading digital creators, platform innovators and their fans converge in one place. We’re launching with an omni-channel approach including a featured creator panel about finding creators’ true fans; a 900-square-foot experiential space where attendees can come and get to know Linktree and our product; a co-hosted happy hour event to encourage creator networking; a social campaign for those at home with FOMO; out-of-home marketing; and potentially even more! Figuring out how the Linktree brand comes to life in the physical world while tying into our digital presence has been such a fun challenge.”
DISQO builds applications to streamline the data collection process in the research industry.
Why Suthar joined: “I joined DISQO because of the people, our values and the opportunity to build both a user-centric mindset and design team within the product organization. Over the past six months, we’ve been working to transform our products so they reflect our transparency value as well as create a fair exchange of value for sharing data with consent. The option of consent is a big differentiator in the market and something that inspires me about DISQO’s business model.”
Accelerating member value: “One of the coolest projects we’re working on currently is how to help people, known as members, who take our surveys understand how sharing their behavioral data works. In conjunction with this, we’re developing ways to accelerate the value members receive by being part of our Survey Junkie community.
This project has given me an opportunity to explore and solve for how we educate and inspire our members and non-members alike and to learn and get value from data sharing, which ultimately inspires brands to create meaningful experiences for them.”
PaymentCloud helps businesses secure credit card processing.
Why Tao joined: “For me, it was all about the culture of the company. When I interviewed for the position, people seemed genuinely engaged in what they were doing and happy to be at work. There was a sense of camaraderie that I hadn’t really experienced elsewhere. We aren’t hidden away in offices and cubicles, so it’s easier for us to connect with one another when we need help and to cheer on each other’s successes. It is not uncommon to hear little cheers or offers of support throughout the day.”
Favorite perk: “Every Friday afternoon we celebrate the week’s birthdays with cake. It’s such a simple thing, but it brings the whole office together for a few minutes and that time is always lighthearted and fun. Watching the whole group gather for the birthday song speaks volumes about the culture of the company as a whole. This is an organization that values relationships not just with our clients and vendors, but within our own workplace. It’s easy for employers to overlook the importance of those relationships.”
Anduril is a defense product company that builds technology for military agencies and border surveillance.
Why Shoro stays: “I was new to the tech space and engineering world when I joined Anduril in December 2020. With an operations and HR background, I was excited to bring my lens to this fast-paced and highly efficient company. I believe that Anduril hires employees who are ready to jump in with a “no job too big or too small” attitude. Anduril’s culture fosters a high level of trust which allows employees to take ownership of their development and growth at the company. Autonomy at Anduril is the primary reason why I have stayed. My responsibilities have increased organically and the freedom to apply my own work style to my role has allowed me to continuously prove my capabilities.”
Favorite benefit: “I am super grateful for Anduril’s unlimited PTO policy as it really supports my work-life balance. It shows me that Anduril values and trusts its employees to take time off when they need to. My managers have encouraged me to take time off, especially after the completion of time-consuming projects. The company views time off to be essential, which is amazing, given that most Americans don’t utilize their given PTO. Anduril also provides all employees with an annual vacation bonus, which really makes me feel rewarded for taking time for myself.”
Invoca specializes in the fields of inbound call marketing, call tracking, call intelligence and pay-per-call advertising.
Why Lavingia joined: “Representation matters; one of the reasons I joined Invoca was because they had a female director of engineering. Her presence on the team gave me hope for a fair and equitable transition into the field.
I’ve stayed at Invoca for three years now because of the sheer amount of investment my teammates and managers have put into my potential. I’ve been afforded technical and leadership opportunities, and I’ve seen us make progress in the hiring of diverse candidates with non-traditional engineering backgrounds. I’m proud to work for a company that believes in advancing the industry from a diversity perspective and values employees who hold them accountable to that mission.”
Empowering opportunities: “Recently, I was given a technical project that needed engineering resources in an area I had very little familiarity with: Security Assertion Markup Language Single Sign On (SAML SSO). And by very little, I mean I didn’t even know what that acronym stood for at the start of the project.
While it was challenging and sometimes daunting, it meant a lot to me that Invoca gave me this technical opportunity. It can be easy, especially for individual contributors and managers, to stick with what’s comfortable. The fact that my manager volunteered me to lead a technical project outside of my team’s specialization and expertise was a clear investment on his part in my technical skills and demonstrated his confidence that I would be able to take on this challenge and find success. Now I feel even more empowered to take on the next challenge that comes my way.”
Demand.io is a network of Web3-driven e-commerce apps and communities that aim to make shopping easier.
Why Gartland stays: “I’ve been at Demand.io for 18 months and can confidently say that the driving force behind my commitment to working at the company is the people and our commitment to making an impact. I feel inspired every day to come and work with great people who share the same energy and enthusiasm for building best-in-class products that impact millions of consumers.”
Bringing the company together: “The coolest project I’ve worked on recently was launching our new iOS extension for SimplyCodes, our coupon code shopping tool. Apple launched Safari web extensions as a new product with the release of iOS 15 and we embraced the challenge to redesign our existing desktop browser extension to work for iOS right around the time Apple was releasing it. In just over two weeks I was able to lead a design sprint that brought the entire company together on one mission to deliver coupons to mobile shoppers globally.
The project challenged me to make rapid decisions in the best interest of users and streamline cross-team communication to ensure we could execute on all the necessary pieces to launch on time. It was a phenomenal example of how nimble and capable our team is under challenging conditions.”
Versus Systems developed Winfinite, which offers in-game prizing across various platforms.
Why Lyle joined: “I’ve always been something of a jack-of-all-trades in my professional life. I thrive on creativity, learning and being exposed to new concepts and ideas. Versus Systems is the type of place where I could see myself contributing to a variety of products and solutions, along many diverse avenues, all focused on making things more fun and engaging. I’m not just contributing to those ideas, but I have a real stake as a driving force behind some of those decisions.”
Favorite perk: “The biggest perk is actually the people responsible for the perks. The people team at Versus is exactly what the name would imply: a team of people whose sole responsibility is to proactively work to make your life better as an employee. As the head of a team with diverse skill sets and ever-evolving product direction, the support I’ve received from them has been critical. I always feel like I have whatever I need to do my job as well as I possibly can.”
Metropolis Technologies develops advanced computer vision and machine learning technology for mobile commerce. The platform is already deployed in hundreds of facilities and industries with billions in opportunity.
Why Korman joined: “The people. My colleagues are both kind and driven. They are solving big, important problems, but always have time for me as a human as well.
I tell people that I want nearly everyone I meet at Metropolis to be both a friend and a mentor. We’re big enough now where I meet new colleagues who echo similar sentiments about the quality of the people at Metropolis, which speaks to how well we’ve continued to hire as we scale.”
Favorite benefit: “I’m proud that Metropolis offers equity options to our team that works in the field. We rely on these folks to empower a remarkable experience, provide product feedback and act as the voice of Metropolis. This benefit, a potentially life-changing opportunity, ties us together in a joint mission and reminds everyone of the important piece they play in our journey.”
Smarkets simplifies peer-to-peer trading on sporting and political events.
Why Healy joined...and stays: “It was the quality of the platform — the visualizations and other aspects are very impressive — combined with the fact that it is UK-based. The opportunity to visit the London office was a huge pull for me as I’d heard a lot about the company culture Smarkets Limited has in all of its offices.
What made me stay is the fact that I am able to make a large impact on the product. Also, the quality of the engineers here is extremely high. I am learning a lot and am encouraged to continue to do so.”
Ambitious designs come to life: “My favorite project so far has been redesigning the geolocation and geofencing feature for SBK, our sports betting app, to be more accurate near borders, as well as building the user interface for the promotions wallet feature. The designs were extremely ambitious, and I had to push my skills hard to implement them. Smarkets enabled me to change teams internally to get experience with a completely new tech stack.”
