Delve Embroiled in Fresh Controversy Over Open Source License Allegations

YC startup Delve is facing yet another wave of criticism after allegations emerged that the company passed off an open source tool as its own work without proper attribution or monetary agreement with the original developer.

The controversy surrounding Delve has been escalating in recent weeks, with a whistleblower known as DeepDelver coming forward with allegations that the company was faking customer data and using rubber-stamping auditors. Now, DeepDelver has made another bombshell claim, alleging that Delve took an open source tool called SimStudio and passed it off as its own work, called Pathways, without proper license attribution or monetary agreement with the original developer, Sim.ai.

According to DeepDelver, the Delve team pitched Pathways to a prospect, who would later become the whistleblower, and claimed that they built it themselves. However, DeepDelver recognized that Pathways looked a lot like SimStudio and asked Delve if it was based on SimStudio. The Delve team denied it, but DeepDelver presented alleged evidence that Pathways was actually a fork of SimStudio, changed just enough to be passed off as Delve's own.

If true, this would be a violation of the Apache software license, which requires the original developer to be credited. Sim.ai's founder and CEO, Emir Karabeg, confirmed to TechCrunch that he answered DeepDelver's questions about the allegations and said that Delve had no license agreement with Sim.ai whatsoever.

The irony is hard to miss: Delve, a startup that purports to sell a compliance solution, may have violated a software license. Adding to the awkwardness, Sim.ai was actually a Delve customer, and both startups were grads of the startup accelerator Y Combinator.

Delve's alleged methods preceded its Series A funding round led by Insight Partners, the whistleblower also alleges. We've reached out to Insight Partners to ask about this, and about the venerable VC firm's due-diligence process.

The allegations that Delve may have violated an open source license of a customer and, apparently, a friend generated so much outcry on X that it has become a trending topic, complete with a scathing community note.

The controversy surrounding Delve has gone from bad to worse this week, and it remains to be seen how the company will respond to these latest allegations.