Confluent CEO Jay Kreps (center) rings the Nasdaq opening bell with co-founders Jun Rao (left) and Neha Narkhede (right). Kreps and Rao are now billionaires, with Narkhede not far behind.
Courtesy of Nasdaq / Confluent
In 2011, three LinkedIn employees — Jay Kreps, Neha Narkhede and Jun Rao — developed a technical tool to help the professional network handle its vast amounts of messages, network requests and profile views. Realizing data streams might be a problem for other companies, not just LinkedIn, the trio open-sourced the software, then set out to build a company around it in 2014 called Confluent.
A decade later, as shares of Confluent have jumped in their first day of trading by more than 20%, Kreps and Rao are billionaires, with Narkhede set to join them should Confluent’s stock continue to rise.
Mountain View, Calif.-based Confluent listed on Nasdaq on Thursday at a price of $36, raising $828 million and valuing the company at about $9.1…