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Alexi Robichaux

Alexi Robichaux is co-founder and CEO of BetterUpBetterUpBetterUp is a U.S. coaching and workforce development platform founded in 2013 that provides human and AI coaching to employees of client organizations; it was valued at $4.7 billion after its 2021 Series E.Open the full entry, a coaching and workforce development platform, and was previously a director of product management at VMware.

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Key facts

Early Life: Programming, Peer Coaching and College

Alexi Robichaux has been interested in coding and peer-to-peer coaching since high school; he taught himself web programming with his younger brother and helped start an organization that would become Youth Leadership America.⁠[1]

Early Career: Socialcast and VMware

After college Robichaux went to Silicon Valley and joined his first start-up, Socialcast; after VMware acquired it, he became a young executive at VMware at around 26.⁠[1][3]

He was director of product management at VMware, leading product and design teams building enterprise collaboration software.⁠[2]

He recalled that he “got extremely burnt out” during VMware’s 18-month integration work, after which he joined a Y Combinator company and went through Y Combinator.⁠[1]

Co-founding BetterUp

Robichaux has said that his own search for help after burning out was the seed of the idea for BetterUp; he brought in Eduardo (Eddie) Medina, a USC classmate who had built a nonprofit with him, as co-founder.⁠[1][4]

BetterUp launched in 2013 with help from friends, family and a few angel investors. He recalled that the early work “went nowhere for two years.”⁠[3][1]

In 2021 he said that as a young executive at a Fortune 500 company, “I wasn’t managing my own psychology in the best way.”⁠[3]

Series E

On October 8, 2021, BetterUp announced a $300 million Series E at a $4.7 billion valuation. Robichaux said: “We are in the midst of the great global awakening surrounding hybrid work, mental health and well-being.”⁠[5]

Launching AI Coaching

In January 2025 BetterUp launched AI coaching, which Robichaux described as “scaling coaching to meet every employee where they are.”⁠[6]

Recognition and Writing

Robichaux was named to the Forbes Future of Work 50 list and contributes to Harvard Business Review and Entrepreneur.⁠[2]

Related Organizations, Websites, and Public Accounts

Sources

  1. The Beginnings of BetterUp (opens in a new window)
  2. Alexi Robichaux (opens in a new window)
  3. BetterUp CEO — and Prince Harry’s New Boss — on Launching a Coaching Start-Up: ‘I Wasn’t Managing My Own Psychology’ (opens in a new window)
  4. About Us (opens in a new window)
  5. BetterUp™ Raises $300 Million Series E at $4.7 Billion Valuation, Making the Company the Largest Mental Health and Coaching Startup in the World (opens in a new window)
  6. BetterUp Launches AI Coaching (opens in a new window)