Which startup was founded by Apoorva Mehta?

Which startup was founded by Apoorva Mehta? The answer is Instacart.

Mehta founded Instacart in 2012 after drawing on a practical problem: getting groceries without owning a car. He had grown up taking buses to grocery stores in Canada, and the experience helped inspire an on-demand grocery-delivery service.

Before Instacart, Mehta worked as a supply-chain engineer at Amazon and reportedly tried about 20 startup ideas. He joined Y Combinator’s summer 2012 batch after demonstrating the service by delivering a six-pack of beer to a Y Combinator partner. The accelerator helped Instacart raise $2.3 million and introduced Mehta to co-founders Max Mullen and Brandon Leonardo.

A common mix-up is confusing Instacart with other delivery platforms such as Shipt, FreshDirect, or Gopuff. Instacart’s defining model connects customers with personal shoppers who select and deliver items from local grocery stores. The company went public on Nasdaq in September 2023 under the legal name Maplebear Inc.