The Twenty Minute VC (20VC) · Saturday, July 4, 2026
Clay Bavor, formerly of Google, has co-founded Sierra, an AI company that has raised over $1.5 billion and is valued at nearly $16 billion. Bavor spent 18 years at Google, working on projects like Gmail and Google Photos before deciding to pursue entrepreneurship when the timing felt right with the rise of language models.
“But before C-array, Clay spent an incredible 18 years at Google, where he worked on some pretty cool projects. Google Labs, naming one, Google Workspace, Gmail, Google Drive, Google Photos. Jesus, is there anything Clay didn't work on at Google?”
“And then in late 22, kind of the planets aligned in a way that I didn't think that they would align again. I'd always wanted to start a company and I started a company when I was 13 years old, and always thought I'd start another.”
“And if you're going to start a company with someone, you want to make sure that they are excellent in competence and in character, and then the timing is right. And we could see that language models were going to be a thing and if ever, you know, there's a time when the proverbial deck of cards are shuffled in favor of, you know, smaller companies, it's when you're at the advent of the new technology.”