Algolia, Inc.
To transform how the world discovers information, helping people find what they need without foraging by transforming discovery into something effortless, understanding intent, surfacing what matters, and delivering results instantly.
Founding Story
Founded in October 2012 by Nicolas Dessaigne and Julien Lemoine, both from Paris, France. While working together at Exalead, they identified a gap in the market by observing developers on StackOverflow trying to embed Apache Lucene into mobile apps and noticed that Google App Engine was not optimized for 'search as you type' functionality for database-stored data. Originally focused on offline search for mobile phones, the company was selected for Y Combinator's Winter 2014 class and shifted toward an API-first search platform.
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Leadership
Founders
Nicolas Dessaigne
Worked at Exalead where he built and led engineering teams on web and enterprise search products. Co-founded Algolia in 2012. Previously served as CEO and is now a General Partner at Y Combinator.
Julien Lemoine
Worked at Exalead where he built and led engineering teams on web and enterprise search products. Has a PhD in Computer Science from the University of Nantes. Co-founded Algolia in 2012 and currently serves as CTO & Chief Architect.
Executive Team
Carlton H. Baab
Interim CEO & Chief Financial Officer
Manages financial strategy, global finance organization, procurement, and mergers/acquisitions. Previously worked at Lithium, CKS Group, and Alfresco. Managed the IPO of CKS Group and the sale of five companies and seven acquisitions. Harvard Business School and University of Southern California graduate.
Katie Goodwin
SVP Global Revenue
Drives revenue across all business segments and oversees global partnerships and strategic investments. Previously served as Head of Sales for the Americas at Dropbox, was an early employee at MongoDB where she helped establish the SLG motion, and spent seven years at Oracle focusing on enterprise accounts.
Business Model
Revenue Model
Usage-based pricing (API usage) and subscription-based tiers. Charges per search request, records stored, recommendation requests, and crawls. Enterprise customers on annual contracts with custom pricing.
Pricing Tiers
10,000 search requests/month, 1 million records included, 10,000 AI Recommendation requests/month, 10,000 crawls/month, 1 Generative Experience Guide included, 3 rules per index. Includes access to try advanced features like Personalization, AI Dynamic Re-ranking, AI Synonyms, and Data Transformations.
Keyword search and browse, query suggestions, 10 rules per index, manual synonyms, data transformation, 30 days analytics retention, third-party integrations and connectors, US/UK/EU hosting locations. Includes 10,000 Recommend requests/month ($0.60 per additional 1,000) and 10,000 crawls/month ($0.80 per additional 1,000).
Everything in Grow plus 10,000 rules per index, AI synonyms, AI ranking, advanced personalization, query categorization, collections, and 90 days analytics retention. Includes 10,000 Recommend requests/month ($0.60 per additional 1,000) and 10,000 crawls/month ($0.80 per additional 1,000).
Enterprise-scale AI search with custom search requests and records and volume-based discounts. Includes NeuralSearch, AI collections, smart groups, real-time personalization, 70+ data centers across 17 regions, SSO, enterprise-level support plans, enhanced SLA, and professional services. Supporting up to 10 applications and 1,000 indices per application.
Target Markets
- B2C ecommerce retailers
- B2B ecommerce and manufacturers/distributors
- Enterprise software companies
- SaaS platforms
- Media and publishing
- Fashion and apparel brands
- Site search
- B2C ecommerce
- B2B ecommerce
- Product discovery
- Developer tools and documentation search
- Media and content discovery
- Shoe Carnival
- Clarks
- Co-op
- Cafeyn
History & Milestones
Named a Leader in the 2025 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Search and Product Discovery
Identified by Gartner as the fastest-growing vendor in the 2025 Magic Quadrant for Search and Product Discovery
Acquired Australian search startup Search.io
Acquired Romanian AI and machine learning startup MorphL
Became a unicorn company with $2.25 billion valuation after raising $150M Series D
1 AI Tool by Algolia, Inc.
Algolia
9moAI-powered search and discovery platform offering AI Search, AI Browse, and AI Recommendations capabilities for ecommerce sites.
