The Andreessen Horowitz-backed database management startup PlanetScale has been quietly poaching senior GitHub employees

• Since May, the database management startup PlanetScale has poached at least 10 GitHub employees, including four this month.
• PlanetScale has raised a total of $25 million at a $80 million valuation, according to PitchBook, from Andreessen Horowitz, SignalFire, and other firms. 
• PlanetScale declined comment while a GitHub spokesperson said that "as at any tech company, people like to take on new challenges over time."
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The database management startup PlanetScale has quietly hired several senior GitHub employees in the last few months.

Launched in 2018 by CEO Jiten Vaidya and CTO Sugu Sougoumarane, who previously worked together at YouTube, the firm has raised a total of $25 million from Andreessen Horowitz, SignalFire and other investors at an $80 million valuation, according to PitchBook.

PlanetScale has hired at least 10 employees from Microsoft-owned GitHub since May, with some poached from senior positions. GitHub's former vice president of engineering, Sam Lambert, is now chief product officer at PlanetScale, according to his LinkedIn, and former engineering director Sam Kottler now holds the same title at the startup. 

In addition, GitHub staff engineer Mike Coutermarsh announced on Twitter on January 8 that he would be joining PlanetScale, as did GitHub software engineering director Nick Van Wiggeren on January 12. In total, at least four employees have joined PlanetScale in January.

The company, which builds a database targeted at developers used by Square, Slack, and JD.com, has 43 employees according to LinkedIn. It declined comment.

A GitHub spokesperson attributed the departures to typical career shifts:

"We have incredible talent at GitHub and, as at any tech company, people like to take on new challenges over time," a GitHub spokesperson said. "We're an enthusiastic customer of PlanetScale and appreciate that we still get to benefit from the great work of people there."

Indeed, tech has the highest job turnover rate compared to other industries, according to a 2018 LinkedIn report. The employees who left GitHub for PlanetScale worked at the company for between little under 1.5 years and nearly nine years, according to their LinkedIn profiles

Meanwhile, GitHub's current employees have found themselves in heated debates internally, as of late. After the company fired a Jewish employee who warned colleagues that "Nazis are about" on the day of the US Capitol siege, some employees were outraged. More than 200 of its roughly 1,700 workers signed an open letter asking management for answers. GitHub CEO Nat Friedman responded saying the company was looking into the matter and "will take any and all appropriate action following a thorough investigation."

Read more: 20 of the hottest enterprise startups of 2019 founded by former Google employees

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