The co-founders of cybersecurity startup Clearly AI have a built-in edge: they’re married.
“There are such a lot of advantages,” mentioned Emily Choi-Greene, CEO of the Seattle-based firm she runs along with her husband Joe Choi-Greene. “There’s full incentive alignment. We’re totally on the identical web page about what we would like in our lives.”
To date, it appears to be working. Lower than two years after launching, Clearly AI simply introduced a $8.4 million seed spherical. The corporate was additionally named one among 10 finalists within the RSAC 2026 Innovation Sandbox Contest, a high-profile competitors tied to the RSA Convention, a significant occasion for the cybersecurity trade.
The spherical consists of backing from Y Combinator, Foundation Set Ventures, Crosspoint Capital, Argon Ventures, and Ritual Capital.
The corporate’s software program helps safety, privateness, and compliance groups evaluate new merchandise, options, distributors, and AI deployments earlier than they ship. As a substitute of counting on spreadsheets, tickets, and guide interviews with engineers, the platform robotically gathers context, assesses danger, and flags the place human evaluate is required.
The startup says its software program is already utilized by 17 enterprise clients, together with Rivian, Ericsson, Okta, Webflow, Affirm, and HID World. Rivian is utilizing Clearly AI to judge privateness and AI danger each time a brand new automobile function is launched.
The co-founders initially met at Amazon. Emily labored on pure language understanding for Alexa and afterward Amazon’s system safety groups, whereas Joe centered on safety and enormous language fashions, together with work on Amazon’s Venture Kuiper (now often known as Leo). After Emily left Amazon for AI startup Moveworks — which was acquired by ServiceNow in 2025 — the couple joined Y Combinator collectively in 2024 and launched Clearly AI shortly after.
Emily mentioned constructing the corporate along with her partner has been a strategic benefit, citing a communication basis that predates the startup. She joked that Y Combinator’s inside steerage on co-founder relationships typically seems like {couples} remedy, however of their case that work was already achieved.
“It’s been completely superior working collectively,” she mentioned.
Clearly AI joins a small however notable membership of corporations launched by {couples} who have been married or went on to get married — together with Eventbrite, Canva, and SlideShare.
The corporate was beforehand featured in GeekWire’s Startup Radar function. Clearly AI has 12 staff and is predicated in Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood.
