Rivet

Founders, Backgrounds, and Bench

Rivet was founded in 2022 by Nathaniel Flurry and Nicholas Kissel. The company is based in San Francisco and participated in the Y Combinator Winter 2024 batch [Y Combinator, 2024].

Summary and Signal

Rivet is positioning itself at the convergence of two developer-heavy trends, multiplayer game infrastructure and stateful AI agents, by offering an open-source, self-hostable alternative to proprietary platforms like Cloudflare's Durable Objects [Y Combinator, 2024]. The company's managed platform for multiplayer games aims to simplify a complex backend challenge with promises of auto-scaling, matchmaking, and DDoS mitigation through minimal code integration [Y Combinator, 2024].

The business model is dual-track, combining a commercial, managed cloud service with a fully open-source core. Funding details include a $500,000 seed round from Y Combinator [Y Combinator, 2024]. The company reports serving a range of customers from indie studios to publicly traded companies [Y Combinator, 2024]. Over the next 12-18 months, key watchpoints include the public launch from its current closed beta, the emergence of named enterprise customers, and community adoption of its open-source project.

Data Accuracy: YELLOW -- Core product claims and YC affiliation are confirmed; funding amount is partially corroborated; team size and customer traction are based on single, unverified sources.

Company Overview

Rivet is a Y Combinator-backed infrastructure startup founded in 2022 by Nathaniel Flurry and Nicholas Kissel, operating from San Francisco [Y Combinator, 2024]. The company's public narrative positions it as a developer-focused alternative to established cloud platforms, initially targeting multiplayer game backends before expanding into a broader open-source runtime for stateful services and AI agents [Y Combinator, 2024].

Following its participation in the Y Combinator Winter 2024 batch, Rivet launched its managed game server platform into a closed beta [Y Combinator, 2024]. A technical blog post in June 2025 provided a detailed comparison of its container platform against Cloudflare and Fly.io [Rivet, 2025]. The company also maintains an open-source presence, with projects like sandbox-agent for running coding AI agents published on GitHub in 2024 [GitHub, 2024]. Headcount is reported at five employees [Y Combinator, 2024].

Data Accuracy: YELLOW -- Key founding and accelerator details confirmed by Y Combinator; headcount and specific milestones rely on single-source company statements.

The Product and the Stack

Rivet’s public positioning presents two distinct product surfaces. The first is a managed platform for multiplayer game servers, providing auto-scaling, matchmaking, and DDoS mitigation [Y Combinator, 2024]. The second is an open-source, self-hostable alternative to Cloudflare’s Durable Objects, targeted at developers building AI agents and stateful services [Y Combinator, 2024].

A June 2025 blog post compares Rivet’s container platform against Cloudflare Containers and Fly Machines, indicating a focus on serverless containers with persistent storage and global distribution [Rivet, 2025]. The company also maintains an open-source project called sandbox-agent on GitHub, which allows developers to run coding AI agents in isolated sandboxes controllable via HTTP [GitHub, 2024]. The company offers a 50% discount on its commercial cloud service to Y Combinator and a16z Speedrun companies [Rivet, 2024].

Data Accuracy: YELLOW -- Product claims are sourced from the company's Y Combinator page and GitHub repository, but specific technical specifications and performance benchmarks are not publicly available.

The Market They Are Entering

Rivet operates at the convergence of managed backend services for multiplayer games and stateful serverless platforms for AI agents. The multiplayer game server hosting market is a subset of the broader game development tools sector. The global games market was estimated at $184.4 billion in 2024 [Newzoo, 2023]. The cloud gaming infrastructure market was projected to reach $6.4 billion by 2027 [MarketsandMarkets, 2022].

For its open-source Durable Objects alternative, Rivet addresses the serverless and edge computing market. Worldwide public cloud services were estimated at $591.8 billion in 2023 [Gartner, 2023]. Demand is emerging from developers building AI applications that require persistent memory, coordination, and WebSocket connections.

Market Segment	Size Estimate (Year)	Source
Global Games Market	$184.4B (2024)	[Newzoo, 2023]
Cloud Gaming Infrastructure	$6.4B by 2027	[MarketsandMarkets, 2022]
Worldwide Public Cloud Services	$591.8B (2023)	[Gartner, 2023]

Data Accuracy: YELLOW -- Market sizing is based on analogous, third-party reports for broader sectors, not Rivet's specific niches.

The Competitive Field

Rivet positions itself as a developer-focused alternative to managed cloud services.

Company	Positioning	Stage / Funding
Rivet	Open-source Durable Objects alternative; managed platform for multiplayer games.	Seed (2024); Y Combinator-backed.
Cloudflare	Global edge network; offers Durable Objects as a proprietary stateful serverless primitive.	Public (NET).
Fly.io	Application platform with global edge deployments and stateful Machines.	Venture-backed (Series B, 2023).
Heroku	Platform-as-a-Service for general web applications.	Acquired by Salesforce (2010).

Data Accuracy: YELLOW -- Competitor positioning and funding stages are confirmed via public sources and company analysis.

Opportunity

Rivet's opportunity lies in capturing a portion of the market for developer-centric, stateful cloud infrastructure. The headline opportunity is to become the default managed platform for multiplayer game backends and the canonical open-source runtime for stateful AI agents [Y Combinator, 2024].

Data Accuracy: YELLOW -- Opportunity framing relies on company claims from YC page and technical blogs; market size context is inferred from industry analysts.

Sources

1. [Y Combinator, 2024] Rivet: Open-Source alternative to Durable Objects | https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/rivet
2. [Rivet, 2024] Rivet | startups | https://rivet.dev/startups/
3. [Fondo, 2024] Rivet launches 🚀 Heroku for multiplayer games | https://www.fondo.com/blog/rivet-launches
4. [Godot Engine, 2024] Rivet - Multiplayer Tooling, Game Servers, & Backend (Open-Source & Self-Hostable) - Godot Asset Library | https://godotengine.org/asset-library/asset/1881
5. [Open Source Alternative, 2024] Rivet | Open Source Alternative to Cloudflare Workers | https://www.opensourcealternative.to/project/rivet
6. [Rivet, 2025] Container Platform Comparison: Cloudflare Containers vs Rivet Containers vs Fly Machines - Rivet | https://rivet.dev/blog/2025-06-24-cloudflare-containers-vs-rivet-containers-vs-fly-machines/
7. [GitHub, 2024] GitHub - rivet-dev/sandbox-agent: Run Coding Agents in Sandboxes. Control Them Over HTTP. Supports Claude Code, Codex, OpenCode, and Amp. | https://github.com/rivet-dev/sandbox-agent
8. [devtools.fm, 2026] Nathan Flurry - Rivet - The Future of Serverless is Stateful by devtools.fm: Developer Tools, Open Source, Software Development | https://creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/devtoolsfm/episodes/Nathan-Flurry---Rivet---The-Future-of-Serverless-is-Stateful-e38r1ml
9. [LinkedIn, 2026] Nathan Flurry - Rivet | LinkedIn | https://www.linkedin.com/in/nathanflurry/
10. [LinkedIn, 2026] Nicholas K. - Rivet | LinkedIn | https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicholaskissel/
11. [Newzoo, 2023] Global Games Market Report 2023 | https://newzoo.com/resources/trend-reports/newzoo-global-games-market-report-2023-free-version
12. [MarketsandMarkets, 2022] Cloud Gaming Market by Type, Device, Gamer Type, Solution and Region - Global Forecast to 2027 | https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/Market-Reports/cloud-gaming-market-1227.html
13. [Gartner, 2023] Gartner Forecasts Worldwide Public Cloud End-User Spending to Reach Nearly $600 Billion in 2023 | https://www.gartner.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2023-04-19-gartner-forecasts-worldwide-public-cloud-end-user-spending-to-reach-nearly-600-billion-in-2023