Two founders who once competed in New York's cutthroat grocery-delivery wars are now building a startup together — this time focused on math software.
Oleg Shevlyagin and Anton Gladkoborodov, whose rival companies 1520 and Fridge No More both collapsed after failed acquisition deals, have raised $7.8 million for Corca, which aims to modernize how people work with math.
The New York-based startup has attracted major investors, including Nvidia's NVentures venture capital arm, NEA, Bloomberg Beta, and Daft Capital.
Corca, short for "collaborative research capability," builds a workspace where users can write equations, run calculations, get AI assistance, and collaborate in real time. In this vein, Corca calls itself "Cursor for math," likening itself to the AI coding startup.
Although they had been competitors, Gladkoborodov and Shevlyagin barely knew each other until after their respective businesses shut down. Living a few blocks apart in Brooklyn, they began meeting to discuss physics — a subject both had studied independently — and eventually became frustrated by how difficult it was to share mathematical equations digitally.
They explored launching another grocery-delivery company before pivoting to math software, and they cofounded Corca in 2023.
Shevlyagin says existing math tools like MATLAB and LaTeX are outdated and rely on complex formatting languages, so teams have to switch between products or share equations via handwritten notes.
"It's like one of those sleeping categories where nothing's going on for more than 30 years," he told Business Insider.
Corca, which has 12 employees, says it has attracted more than 10,000 users and plans to use the seed funding to develop its product and expand its engineering team. Its core product will remain free while it develops paid AI and computational features planned for later this year.
Corca sees engineers, researchers, and other technical professionals as its primary market, particularly in fields like AI and finance.
Gladkoborodov said Nvidia's interest likely stemmed from the startup's focus on the math that underpins those industries.
"We see ourselves as infrastructure for mathematical work," Gladkoborodov said. "Whether the application is AI research, engineering, robotics, finance, or scientific computing, people still need a way to create, compute, and collaborate around mathematical models."
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Geoff Weiss is a senior reporter on Business Insider’s tech team, where he writes about AI startups and Y Combinator, the intersection of AI and the media industry, and workplace dynamics within top AI labs and chip companies.Previously, Geoff was on the media desk, covering YouTube and Netflix, and themes like the intersection of Hollywood and the creator economy. His work on Netflix’s video podcasting ambitions and Mr Beast’s lessons for Hollywood won second and first prize, respectively, at the 2025 LA Press Club Awards.Prior to joining Business Insider, Geoff was the senior editor of Tubefilter and a staff writer at Entrepreneur. He graduated from New York University with a degree in English Literature.He can be reached at [email protected], on Signal @geoffweiss.25, and on LinkedIn. Have a tip? Use a personal email address and a nonwork device; here's our guide to sharing information securely.Selected stories:Nvidia crushed its quarter — and CEO Jensen Huang said in a leaked all-hands that 'the market did not appreciate it'Nvidia will foot the bill for Trump's new visa fees. Here's what CEO Jensen Huang told staff.Massive AI salaries and RTO are fueling a real estate boom in San Francisco: 'It's going to rain money'The AI talent wars are ricocheting across startups. Here's how they're competing with Big Tech.
