The company behind Zulip
Kandra Labs
Zulip is developed, hosted and supported by Kandra Labs, a company owned by the nonprofit Zulip Foundation; more than 1,500 people have contributed code to the open-source project. Kandra Labs earns money from Zulip Cloud subscriptions and from push-notification and support plans for self-hosted servers; the foundation can also take grants and donations.
Read on Oct 6, 2026 from the company’s own pages and from news reports.
Zulip at a glance
- Founded
- 2016
- Based in
- San Francisco, California
- Team
- 12 people
- Ownership
- Nonprofit
Who runs Zulip
The people Kandra Labs names itself, or a news report about it names, with the job given there.
Zulip funding
Its founder wrote in May 2026 that he had been reluctant to take external funding, so the company was funded by his own investment on top of subscription revenue; he then donated it to the nonprofit Zulip Foundation. Its history page says Kandra Labs has been supported by nearly $1M in SBIR grants from the US National Science Foundation. blog.zulip.comzulip.com
Company details
- Ownership
- Nonprofit. Kandra Labs is fully owned by the Zulip Foundation, an independent nonprofit created in May 2026 when its founder donated the company to it; the announcement says there are no other stockholders. blog.zulip.com
- Founded
- 2016 zulip.com
- Based in
- San Francisco, California zulip.com
- Team
- 12 Kandra Labs team members stayed on to work on Zulip when four of its leaders left in May 2026, according to its announcement blog.zulip.com
- Hiring
- One listing, for leadership team roles spanning technical, business, management, marketing, sales and product. All openings are remote. zulip.com
- Partner program
- Partner program for resellers, value-added resellers, managed service providers and hosting providers, with a partner onboarding kit. No commission or discount terms are published. zulip.com
Zulip on social media and the web
- Blog · blog.zulip.com
- Changelog · zulip.readthedocs.io
- Newsletter · groups.google.com
- Community · zulip.com
- Status page · status.zulip.com
- Careers · zulip.com
Only accounts Kandra Labs links to from its own site, so you know they are its own.
Zulip news and launches
- Sep 21, 2026Zulip Server 12.3 security release
- Aug 10, 2026Zulip Server 12.2 security release
- Jun 26, 2026Zulip Server 12.1 bug fix release
- May 15, 2026Announcing the Zulip Foundation
Questions about Zulip the company
Who runs Zulip?
Kandra Labs's pages name Kim Vandiver (Interim President of Kandra Labs, named in May 2026) and Tim Abbott (Founder; director of the Zulip Foundation board). None of them is named as chief executive on the pages read, as read on Oct 6, 2026.
Who founded Zulip?
Tim Abbott is named as a founder of Kandra Labs, which was founded in 2016.
How much funding has Zulip raised?
Its founder wrote in May 2026 that he had been reluctant to take external funding, so the company was funded by his own investment on top of subscription revenue; he then donated it to the nonprofit Zulip Foundation. Its history page says Kandra Labs has been supported by nearly $1M in SBIR grants from the US National Science Foundation.
What is Zulip's valuation?
No valuation was found in Kandra Labs's announcements or in news reports, as read on Oct 6, 2026. Private companies usually do not publish one.
Who owns Zulip?
Kandra Labs is fully owned by the Zulip Foundation, an independent nonprofit created in May 2026 when its founder donated the company to it; the announcement says there are no other stockholders.
Where is Zulip based?
Kandra Labs gives its base as San Francisco, California.
How many people work at Zulip?
12 Kandra Labs team members stayed on to work on Zulip when four of its leaders left in May 2026, according to its announcement.
Is Zulip hiring?
One listing, for leadership team roles spanning technical, business, management, marketing, sales and product. All openings are remote.
Where this comes from
Read on Oct 6, 2026. Facts come from Kandra Labs’s own pages, news reports and investors’ own announcements; nothing from paid data sites. What no page states is left out. If something here is out of date, the company can send a correction through the vendor page.