When SpaceX agreed to buy Cursor for $60 billion, it cemented Michael Truell’s status as one of Silicon Valley’s youngest breakout CEOs. The 25‑year‑old founder had already turned an AI coding project into a staple for enterprise developers and built a hiring funnel out of the community that grew up around it.<br /><br />That wasn’t obvious when he and three fellow programmers first started Anysphere (Cursor’s parent company) in early 2022, which Truell called the “prehistoric times” of AI in a keynote speech at Cursor’s inaugural Compile conference published Monday. At the time, Big Tech companies and well-funded labs were already developing AI coding tools, and the four founders, all in their early 20s, were wary of entering such a crowded field.
