Mark Moriarty — EB-1A

Claim F. Judge of peers

6 min read

Note to Fragomen: I was a judge in four hackathons (and a speaker in three, or maybe four of those). The fourth happens next weekend in Standford: “Treehacks”, and I gather it’s a genuinely prestigious hackathon to be associated with.

1. April 2025: Judge and speaker at “AI × Commerce” hackathon in AGI House

See https://app.agihouse.org/events/ai-commerce-20250405.

Mr Moriarty was a speaker, presenting live demos of Stripe’s latest agentic tools. In addition, he was a judge, evaluating the participants’ final submissions and awarding prizes. AGI House is a respected institution in Silicon Valley, attracting some of the brightest entrepreneurs and founders.

^Download image to use inline: Replit-hackathon-1-cropped-annotated.jpeg

𝕏 posts:

^Download image of 𝕏 posts: agi house X post.png (Additional images in appendix below)

2. 2025: Judge and speaker at Replit Stripe Hackathon

On 18 October 2025, Mr Moriarty was a judge at the “Stripe x Replit x SV Angel Generative AI hackathon”.

Event page: https://luma.com/55g5zwcg This was an exclusive invite-only hackathon, with over 100 attendees.

^Download image to use inline: Replit-hackathon-1-cropped-annotated.jpeg

X post (aka “tweet”): https://x.com/MbyM/status/1979825090662678817 Download image of 𝕏 post: replit-hackathon-tweet.png

(Full set of images in appendix below)

{TBD: hyperlink to video?}

3. November 2025: Judge and speaker at “agentic commerce” hackathon in YCombinator

Last November, Stripe was a sponsor of the “Locus × YCombinator” Agentic Payments hackathon. Mr Moriarty was the sole Stripe judge for this exclusive hackathon held in YCombinator headquarters. Mr Moriarty:

  1. Wrote the Stripe track: instructions guide for participants (written by Mark Moriarty)
  2. Judged tens of submissions.
  3. Selected the top three submissions to win prizes worth $6,000.
  4. Spoke to the entire participant pool on behalf of Stripe, in addition to awarding the three prizes.

LinkedIn post: URL of LinkedIn post: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/moriartym_hackathon-yc-sanfrancisco-activity-7402439098571141120-zWzZ Or download image for appendix: YC Nov hackathon linkedin.png

Here’s the Notion link(https://petalite-creator-ade.notion.site/Agentic-Payments-Hackathon-2aa8f277791880d295fed41a45f3a330) of all the tracks That site lists Mark Moriarty as the one judge representing Stripe.

4. February 2026: Judge at Stanford “Tree Hacks” hackathon in Stanford

Links:

This year, Mr Moriarty was the only Stripe employ at this hackathon. Again, he was attending in the capacity of a judge.

TBD if this helps the point: “Stripe was not a sponsor (the organisers literally turned down Stripe’s offer of sponsorship because they were full up!) but nonetheless Mark was invited to be a judge anyway – based on his individual reputation, not “just because he works for Stripe”.

{ToDo: add evidence of Mark’s participation after Sunday Feb 15th.}

5. Interviewer at Stripe

Over the past 12 months, Mr Moriarty has hired for four different teams at Stripe:

  1. Corporate Strategy
  2. Experimental Projects
  3. Internal Communications
  4. Global Partnerships Across these interviews, Mr Moriarty has interviewed over 50 candidates and 19 roles have been filled.

The fact that multiple teams rely on Mark’s judgement for whom Stripe should hire or decline hiring is testament to his peer set looking up to him for judgement and evaluation of the work of others.

ToDo: Re-phrase with better legal language more closely matching the requirement for this claim.

6. Angel investor

Given his prominent position in Stripe, and regular appearances as a speaker and thought leader at events, Mr Moriarty is regularly asked for advice by founders. Occasionally, founders will also pitch Mr Moriarty for investment.

As such, Mr Moriarty is now on “the other side of the table” as an “angel investor”, investing his personal savings into nascent startups.

His most recent investment was a personal $80,000 investment into the startup behind GetASAP.us, “enabling sub 8-hour delivery of farm-fresh produce”.

Similar to evaluating hackathon entrants when deciding who to award prizes to (paid for by the sponsors), Mr Moriarty also evaluates founders who pitch him for person investment. In 2024, Mr Moriarty invested in one startup, and in 2025, Mr Moriarty invested in three more startups.

All the companies that received investment from Mr Moriarty are US-based C-Corporations (incorporated in Delaware, as is most common for early-stage startups).

All four startups Mr Moriarty has funded are pushing innovation forward using new technologies, including AI, namely:

  1. Jump ‘n’ Pass: Mobile Self-Checkout For Modern Retail
    • Website: jumpnpass.com
    • Legal entity: Kiakia Inc., a Delaware C corporation (T/A Jump ‘n’ Pass)
  2. Parachute AI: Infrastructure for hospitals to monitor and deploy clinical AI
    • Website: parachute-ai.com
    • More details: ycombinator.com/companies/parachute
    • Problem it’s solving: AI mistakes cost lives, while deployment delays cost millions. Parachute prevents both.
    • Legal entity: Parachute Inc., a Delaware C corporation.
  3. Astor: AI advisor for retail investors
    • Website: JoinAstor.com
    • About: ycombinator.com/companies/astor
    • Legal entity: Gauss Inc., a Delaware C corporation (T/A Astor)
  4. GetASAP: Tech-Enabled Produce Distributor for Global Retail
    • Website: GetASAP.us
    • Legal entity: Blaze Market Inc, a Delaware C corporation (T/A GetASAP)

Investment document:

Maybe reference this in the section of “Why Mr Moriarty is good for the USA”. There’s a nice point here about “when he makes money, he turns right around and invests it back into other US startups” (as opposed to, for example, remitting earnings home to a country overseas)

— — —

Appendix (more images or proof I was a judge)

Appendix F.1 = AGI House:

Event URL (still online): https://app.agihouse.org/events/ai-commerce-20250405

Download:AGI Commerce hackathon landing page.png

^Download image to use inline: Replit-hackathon-1-cropped-annotated.jpeg

Download: AGI Commerce hackathon speakers annotated.png

Download image of email: Email to judges - Judging Sheet.png

PDF of this email (showing it was sent to markmoriarty@stripe.com): Email to judges - Judging Sheet.pdf

Appendix F.2 = Replit hackathon

Luma event page.png ^Download: replit-hackathon-tweet.png

^Download Replit-hackathon-1.jpeg

^Download Replit-hackathon-2.jpeg

Download Replit-hackathon-3-highlighted.jpeg

^Download Replit-hackathon-4.jpeg

Appendix F.3 = YCombinator (Locus) hackathon

Above: annotated. Below: original.

Appendix F.4 = TreeHacks Stanford hackathon

https://x.com/hackwithtrees/status/2018066931136516465

Appendix F.5 = Interviewing for four teams

As evidence, it’s probably simplest to include this in some letter?

Appendix F.6 = Investing in startups

As evidence, I could include copies of the investment documents.

Or, it might be cool to show the landing page of some of the startups. Less emphasis on proving Mark really invested, more emphasis on making it look cool and cutting-edge. “Mark is investing in cool new tech”.

GetASAP

Parachute AI

Screenshot of bank transfers to startups in September

Graph View

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