Phoebe Gates, co-founder of artificial intelligence shopping app Phia and daughter of Microsoft founder Bill Gates, just raised $30 million for the app she launched in her Stanford dorm room.
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Phoebe Gates, co-founder of artificial intelligence shopping app Phia, speaks onstage at TechCrunch Disrupt at San Francisco’s Moscone Center on Oct. 28. Gates, daughter of Microsoft founder Bill Gates, just raised $30 million for the app — with Hailey Bieber and Kris Jenner on board.
Kimberly White/Getty Images for TechCrunch
Phoebe Gates, the youngest daughter of Bill Gates and Melinda French Gates, has secured $30 million in new funding for an artificial intelligence-powered shopping platform.
Phia, a startup Gates co-founded with Stanford University classmate Sophia Kianni, has quickly become a magnet for high-profile backers, drawing support from Hailey Bieber, Kris Jenner, Meta’s former Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg and Spanx founder Sara Blakely.
The new round of funding — confirmed by a company spokesperson to Bloomberg — values the New York-based firm at $180 million, a sharp jump from the $8 million Phia raised in September.
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Gates and Kianni first began experimenting with generative AI in a Stanford class that pushed students to explore practical applications.
Melinda French Gates, left, and daughter Phoebe Gates in September 2024. Phoebe, 23, just raised $30 million for her AI shopping app — with Hailey Bieber and Kris Jenner on board.
John Lamparski/AFP via Getty Images
After briefly considering a concept for a “Bluetooth tampon,” they shifted to a frustration they shared as roommates: the endless tabs, inconsistent prices and lack of transparency that define much of online shopping.
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A $250,000 grant from a Stanford social entrepreneurship program helped them pursue the project full time and ultimately relocate to New York.
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Gates told Elle that when she first floated the idea to her parents, they urged her to keep it as a side project — advice she followed by enrolling in Stanford’s night program after moving to New York and finishing her degree in 2024.
“They were like, ‘Okay, you can do this as a side thing, but you need to stay in school.’ I don’t think people would expect that from my family, to be honest,” she said. Her father dropped out of Harvard University in 1975 to launch Microsoft.
Kianni even paused her degree temporarily “to learn, as quickly as possible, as much as we could about the industry that we would be operating in,” she told Vogue.
Bill Gates has not invested in the company, though he has publicly supported its mission.
Phia pitches itself as a fix for what it calls a broken online shopping experience, where customers “waste time looking for deals or particular items, while brands are targeting the wrong consumers.”
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Its AI-powered search engine — available as an app and as a browser extension for Chrome and Safari — pulls listings from more than 40,000 retail and resale sites so users can compare prices, surface real-time deals, and determine whether an item’s cost is typical, high or fair.
The tool has reached 750,000 downloads in eight months.
Gates told Elle she sees secondhand shopping as a key part of the platform’s value.
“There are enough clothes on the planet for the next six generations,” she said. “We don’t need to buy new clothes. The rise in secondhand fashion is really exciting. We just need to make it a lot easier for consumers.”
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At 23, Gates now leads a rapidly evolving product with fewer than a dozen full-time employees.
She and Kianni say they aim to build a true end-to-end AI shopping assistant — one that can eventually anticipate users’ needs and deliver personalized recommendations.
“We’re building what we wish existed when we were in college,” Gates told Vogue.
Beyond Phia, Gates said she hopes her success will allow her to invest in other women founders, noting that just 2% venture capitalist funding goes to women.
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“That’s criminal,” she said.