Seattle startup SDF Labs has entered the tech industry as a company geared toward helping software developers manage their enterprise data warehouse systems. The company announced the public availability of its products this week and also noted its $9 million in seed funding.
Over the last two years, SDF (Semantic Data Fabric) has been creating what it calls a SQL compiler and database engine capable of analyzing SQL code and providing information on how data is moved throughout different warehouses, effectively catching possible bugs or errors during the process.
Specifically, when companies use additional data with thousands of SQL statements, there is an increase in the risk of dependency errors. This is where SDF is offering its services.
SDF CEO and co-founder Lukas Schulte said, “SDF provides a software toolset for faster developer feedback as you’re writing data models.” Essentially, there is no need to pay for cloud-based compiler tools, as the software runs on local machines.
In a blog post, the company wrote, “SDF extracts SQL compilers from their clouds and puts them on your laptop to power the next generation of data developer tooling.” Currently, SDF has paying customers within a few companies including ClassDojo, Linqto, and Obie.
Schulte said, “Understanding how data moves through a system from ingestion to consumption is incredibly challenging yet incredibly important for everything from developer productivity to cost optimization to data governance to building out proper training sets for AI models with robust data provenance.”
Previously, Schulte led the Los Angeles startup PiñataFarms, which creates consumer creative video tools. Lukas’s father, Wolfram Schulte, is also a co-founder of SDF and brings more than 17 years of experience as an engineering leader at Microsoft. Most recently, he served as a principal architect at Meta, where he worked with data warehouse infrastructure.
Among the other co-founders of SDF are Michael Levin, who also worked with Meta and Microsoft, and Elias DeFaria, a founding engineer at PiñataFarms, who formerly co-founded a music streaming platform.
Levin’s career spans multiple years working in big tech and academia, with experience covering programming language design, compilers, data modeling, privacy, static and dynamic analysis tools for very large code bases, and monitoring and diagnostic systems. DeFaria’s career thus far has maintained a stable focus on building digital products and applications.
Of course, there are multiple investors on board with the startup, with more attention daily. Investors in SDF include Founders’ Co-op and RTP Global, as well as Two Sigma Ventures, Sequoia, and Andreessen Horowitz.
General Partner at Founders’ Co-op, Aviel Ginzburg, said, “SDF is the antidote to a data world that has lost its mind.” He continued, “Their vision removes all of the complexity without asking folks to change the way they think about data and provides results. Each of us saw this challenge all across our portfolio, and I felt that firsthand as a founder.”
With half of the team based at its downtown Seattle headquarters, SDF actively employs a total of 15 people.
