👨💻Moonlighting King: How Soham Parekh Fooled Silicon Valley Startups

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Market Watch

• Indian indices failed to build on the morning gains and ended lower in a yet another volatile session on July 3, with Nifty around 25,400. At close, the Sensex was down 170.22 points or 0.20 percent at 83,239.47, and the Nifty was down 48.10 points or 0.19 percent at 25,405.30.
• On the back of positive global cues, amid US and Vietnam trade agreement, the Indian market opened higher and saw extended buying in the first half with Nifty inching closer to 25,600. However, last hour profit booking erased all the intraday gains to end near day's low.

ICYMI

• ✈️ A stranded F-35B jet in Kerala will be airlifted by a C-17 Globemaster in a rare military move.
• 🕯️ Diogo Jota, Liverpool star, dies in a car crash just 10 days after his wedding.
• 🎬 Ramayana teaser shows Ranbir as Rama and Yash as Ravana in an epic first look.
• 🏑 The Pakistan hockey team will visit India next month, likely cleared for Asia Cup participation.
• 🧾 Trump’s immigration bill awaits final vote and could impact Indians significantly.
• 😱 A Boeing 737 plane plunged 26,000 ft mid-air, causing panic and oxygen mask deployment.
• 🚫 Patanjali ads have been barred for misleading comparisons with Dabur Chyawanprash.

Intresting case of Soham Parekh

In July 2025, the tech world was shaken by a major controversy involving Indian software engineer Soham Parekh.

• He is accused of working at multiple early-stage US-based startups at the same time without informing any of them.
• This practice, often referred to as moonlighting, has triggered a heated debate about ethics, hiring, and the culture of remote work.

👨💻 The Allegations

• The controversy came to light when Suhail Doshi, co-founder and former CEO of Mixpanel, publicly accused Parekh of misleading at least three to four startups. Many of these companies were backed by Y Combinator.
• Doshi claimed that nearly 90 percent of the information on Parekh’s resume was fabricated and that Parekh was working across multiple high-impact roles simultaneously.

• Founders from startups like Lindy, Fleet AI, and Antimetal shared similar experiences.

• They said Parekh performed well during interviews but later appeared distracted and unresponsive.
• Further investigation revealed he was holding several positions at once, with some founders claiming he worked at more than four startups during the same period.

🌍 Moonlighting was not the issue

🎓 Questionable Resume

According to his alleged resume, Parekh claimed to hold the following credentials:

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Engineering from the University of Mumbai, with a GPA of 9.83 out of 10
• Master’s degree in Computer Science from the Georgia Institute of Technology

He also listed job roles such as:

• Senior Software Engineer at Dynamo AI
• Senior Fullstack Engineer at Union.ai and Synthesia
• Founding Software Engineer at Alan AI
• Open Source Fellow at GitHub

Due to the allegations, many are now questioning the authenticity of these qualifications and job titles.

🤐 Response So Far

Parekh has not made any public statement regarding the accusations. However, reports suggest he privately reached out to at least one employer to express regret.

⚠️ Important Clarification

Another software engineer named Soham Parekh currently works at D E Shaw India and has no connection to the controversy. He has publicly clarified on LinkedIn that he is not involved in the situation and urged others to stop confusing their identities.

Not all Soham Parekh are same:

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Hi, I’m Aniket Mishra, the editor of this newsletter. I’d love to hear some feedback. WhatsApp me directly and tell me what you think.