The tech world remains to be reeling from revelations that Soham Parekh, an Indian engineer, secretly held as many as 5 to 6 full-time jobs at elite US startups, pocketing as much as $800,000 or Rs 6.8 crores a 12 months, by juggling overlapping work schedules and faux credentials.
Now, Dhruv Amin, co-founder of Create, an AI “text-to-app” builder in San Francisco, has spoken publicly about his expensive expertise hiring Parekh, calling the ordeal a “drain of 1 month of time, focus, and power.”
In an in depth put up, Amin recounted how Parekh was initially advisable by a recruiter and “crushed” the in-person programming interview. “I imagine he is really an excellent engineer,” Amin wrote. “some have stated ‘that is the hazard of credentials.’ we did not care, we cared he might ship.”
But crimson flags started showing nearly instantly. Parekh went darkish earlier than his begin date, then referred to as in sick on day one, providing an deal with at an SF workplace constructing as a substitute of a house for transport his laptop computer. Suspicions deepened when Amin’s co-founder found Parekh’s GitHub account was lively with commits to different non-public repos, whilst Parekh claimed sickness.
“My co-founder was prepared to maneuver on then (an excessive amount of smoke),” Amin stated. Though Parekh carried out impressively on his first in-person day, issues unraveled rapidly. “the following few days all of it fell aside,” Amin wrote, citing repeated sick days, claims of a brand new power situation, and incomplete work that ought to have taken half a day however lingered for days.
Amin finally found Parekh was nonetheless linked to a different startup, Sync Labs, regardless of repeated denials. The ultimate straw got here when Sync Labs dropped an employee-of-the-month video that includes Parekh on the exact same day Amin confronted him.
“Advised him working 2+ locations similar time was breach of FTE contract so not going to course of first payroll. no argument from him. he simply dipped,” Amin wrote. He added, “it was embarrassing till yesterday when i noticed how widespread. then i used to be pissed. then impressed. nonetheless unsure how he pulled it off for thus lengthy with in particular person startups with lengthy hours, however appreciated the hustle. hope he had an excellent purpose. looks like a aggravating approach to earn cash.”
Parekh, in the meantime, has damaged his silence on the controversy. “I am not happy with what I’ve performed. However, you already know, monetary circumstances, primarily. Nobody actually likes to work 140 hours per week, proper? However I had to do that out of necessity. I used to be in extraordinarily dire monetary circumstances,” he stated, insisting that he completed all of the work with out assist from AI instruments or different engineers.
Parekh has since introduced he’s joined Darwin, a brand new AI agency in San Francisco, and says he has no plans to carry a number of jobs once more.
Regardless of the fiasco, Amin concluded on a word of cautious goodwill: “he is an excellent eng so will in all probability be positive. largest mistake was mendacity repeatedly which simply kills any group’s belief quick. off the chest so shifting on :)”
