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§ Private Profile · San Francisco, CA, USA
Messenger for communities
Openland has raised $2.0M across 1 funding round.
Key people at Openland.
Openland was founded in 2017 by Yury Lifshits (CEO / Co-Founder — Discord alternative, now open source).
Openland has raised $2.0M in total across 1 funding round.
Openland is a messenger for communities. It is focused on fundamental human needs: making new friends, safe self-expression, and learning from others. Openland is a home for some of the most active and supportive chat communities on the Internet. Anyone can start and grow their own community on Openland, for free. Openland was founded in 2017 and is based in San Francisco. The company is backed by 30 prominent venture investors, including Y Combinator, Gagarin Capital, Sinai Ventures, Soma Capital, Liquid 2 Ventures, and Rainfall Ventures.
Key people at Openland.
Openland has raised $2.0M across 1 funding round. Most recently, it raised $2.0M Seed in August 2018.
| Date | Round | Lead Investors | Other Investors | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aug 1, 2018 | $2M Seed | — | 645 Ventures, Accel, Afore Capital, Alpha Prime Fund, Altair Capital Management, ALT Capital, Astanor Ventures, Bain Capital Ventures, TJ Nahigian, Citi Ventures, Cometa, Commerce Ventures, Dynamo Ventures, Flint Capital, Footwork, Forerunner Ventures, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Mouro Capital, Operator Stack, Pioneer Fund, Rainfall Ventures, Scale Venture Partners, Sierra Ventures, Sinai Ventures, Twelve Below, Work Bench, Y Combinator, Amit Jhawar, Justin Mateen | Announced |
Openland was founded in 2017 by Yury Lifshits (CEO / Co-Founder — Discord alternative, now open source).
Openland has raised $2.0M in total across 1 funding round.
Openland's investors include 645 Ventures, Accel, Afore Capital, Alpha Prime Fund, Altair Capital Management, Alt Capital, Astanor Ventures, Bain Capital Ventures, TJ Nahigian, Citi Ventures, Cometa, Commerce Ventures.
Openland is a messenger platform designed for communities, focusing on fundamental human needs such as making new friends, safe self-expression, and learning from others. It enables anyone to start and grow chat-based communities for free, serving as a home for active and supportive online groups. Originally, Openland targeted stakeholders in the real estate development industry—owners, builders, investors, brokers, local officials, and tenants—providing a specialized messaging tool to facilitate faster communication and deal-making in the building lifecycle. The platform aims to support daily interactions and transactions within these communities, with plans to add features like offers, escrows, and digital signatures to streamline real estate development processes[1][4].
Founded in 2017 by Yury Lifshits, a former Yahoo data scientist, and Steve Korshakov, a former Telegram engineer, Openland emerged from Lifshits’ research into housing costs and occupancy rates in the San Francisco Bay Area. He identified inefficiencies in real estate development communication and envisioned a platform to connect all stakeholders involved in the building process. The company participated in Y Combinator’s Winter 2018 batch and raised over $2 million in funding from prominent investors including Y Combinator itself. Early traction came from positioning Openland as a messaging tool tailored to real estate development, facilitating community organization by interests and roles and enabling deal matching through chat[1][4][8].
Openland rides the growing trend of community-driven communication platforms that emphasize safe, meaningful interactions over broad social media broadcasts. Its timing aligns with increasing demand for specialized, role-based community tools that facilitate collaboration and transactions, particularly in complex industries like real estate. The platform addresses market forces such as the need for faster deal-making, transparency, and integrated communication among diverse stakeholders. By focusing on community and transactional workflows, Openland influences the broader ecosystem by demonstrating how messaging platforms can evolve beyond social chat to become essential business tools[1][4][8].
Looking ahead, Openland’s future lies in expanding its transactional capabilities and broadening its user base beyond real estate to other industries that require structured community communication and deal facilitation. Trends such as remote collaboration, digital transformation of traditional industries, and demand for privacy and safe self-expression will shape its journey. As it integrates more sophisticated tools for transactions and daily business communication, Openland could evolve into a critical platform for professional communities, potentially influencing how industries organize and transact digitally. Its open-source approach may also foster innovation and adoption by developers and enterprises alike[4][9].
