SDF
The business, the turning points, and the decisions behind them.
Some sections are still being researched2 / 4
Sections to complete：02 · 05
01 / WHAT IT BUILT
What the company did
SDF Labs was a Seattle data-warehousing startup founded in 2022 by CEO Lukas Schulte together with his father Wolfram Schulte — a Microsoft engineering leader of more than 17 years and most recently a principal architect at Meta working on data warehouse infrastructure — plus Michael Levin (Microsoft, Meta) and Elias DeFaria (founding engineer at PiñataFarms). Its software analyzed SQL code and gave insight into how data moved across enterprise warehouses, flagging potential errors or bugs. It raised $9 million in seed funding from Founders' Co-op, RTP Global, Two Sigma Ventures, Sequoia and Andreessen Horowitz.
02 / FAILURE REASONS
Material for this section is being gathered and checked. It will appear here once ready.
03 / EVENT HISTORY
Events in the structured record
- Company founded
SDF Labs is founded in Seattle to analyze SQL code and manage enterprise data warehouse systems.
- Product launch and seed funding
SDF emerges with its SQL-analysis product and raises $9 million in seed funding from Sequoia, Andreessen Horowitz and others.
- Acquired by dbt Labs
In January 2025, Philadelphia-based dbt Labs announces the acquisition of SDF Labs, calling its SQL parsing capabilities a 'step function change' for the dbt developer experience.
04 / CONTEMPORARY REBUILD ASSESSMENT
Difficulty of rebuilding this project today
Material for this section is being gathered and checked. It will appear here once ready.
Overall assessment: Not completed
05 / CAUSAL CHAIN / AFTERMATH
Material for this section is being gathered and checked. It will appear here once ready.