Founders
DAVID BASZUCKI
David is the founder and CEO of Roblox, a global platform where millions of people around the world gather together every day to imagine, create and share experiences with each other in immersive, user-generated 3D worlds. Pioneering the category of virtual human co-experience, Roblox became a publicly traded company on the New York Stock Exchange in March of 2021. David has committed any additional compensation he receives as CEO toward philanthropic purposes.
With his wife, Jan Ellison Baszucki, David has funded neuropsychiatric research for many years. Together, David and Jan launched Baszucki Group in 2021 to propel and expand this work and to address societal change in other areas. David co-directs Baszucki Group’s philanthropic investment strategy, with particular interests in metabolic health, democracy and astronomy. David and Jan have four children and live in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Originally from Canada, David grew up in Eden Prairie, Minnesota, where he spent time outdoors riding dirt bikes and building go-karts. As a child, he liked to read the encyclopedia, and he enjoyed science fiction novels that transported him to different worlds. In high school, he led his school’s quiz bowl team and played saxophone in the all-state band. David studied electrical engineering and computer science at Stanford, where he became a General Motors Scholar. He spent two summers in Flint, Michigan, as an intern at Buick product engineering.
Prior to Roblox, David, Erik Cassel, and his brother, Greg, founded Knowledge Revolution in the late 1980s. They created “Interactive Physics,” a leading educational physics software package. The company later built a 3D mechanical engineering simulator for companies producing a range of products, from cars to cameras to farm equipment to copy machines. Knowledge Revolution was acquired by MSC Software Corporation and after several years, David left to pursue other interests.
David dabbled in angel investing, hosted his own talk radio show, and crossed the Western U.S. and Canada in a motorhome with Jan and their children. Returning home, David was joined by Erik Cassel, who had been the lead engineer at Knowledge Revolution, in a one-room office in Menlo Park. They began writing the simulation code that would ultimately become the foundation of Roblox. Erik died of cancer in 2013. David continues the work of Roblox in Erik’s memory.
JAN ELLISON BASZUCKI
Jan is president of Baszucki Group. A former Silicon Valley fintech marketing executive, Jan is a writer, parent, mental health advocate and aspiring citizen scientist. She is the author of the national bestselling debut novel, A Small Indiscretion, which was a San Francisco Chronicle recommended book of 2015. Her essays have appeared in publications like The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and Writer’s Digest, and her short fiction has received numerous awards, including an O. Henry Prize for her first published story.
Jan holds an undergraduate degree from Stanford, and an MFA from San Francisco State University. She is currently at work on a memoir about her son’s recovery from bipolar disorder with a 100-year-old metabolic treatment for epilepsy.
Jan is married to David Baszucki, founder and CEO of Roblox. David and Jan have a son and three daughters and live in the San Francisco Bay Area. Together, they co-founded Baszucki Group to advance the family’s philanthropic goals. Jan co-directs strategy and runs day-to-day operations. Jan’s particular passions include metabolic treatments for mental illness, regenerative approaches to both food production and environmental conservation, and electoral initiatives that combine open primaries with instant run-off voting.
After college, Jan spent two years in Hawaii, Australia and Southeast Asia. She worked as a waitress and a typist, trekked solo in the Himalayas, took trains across India and job-hunted in Hong Kong. Before that, Jan took a gap year in college to study French in Paris, work in an office in London, and try her hand at writing. A decade later, her notebooks from those travels inspired her novel, essays and stories.
In the 1990s, Jan spent seven years leading product and corporate marketing for Silicon Valley fintech startup Infinity Financial Technology, which produced derivatives trading and risk management systems. After Infinity went public and was then acquired, Jan left to devote herself to writing and raising a family. When their son was diagnosed with bipolar disorder at age 19, Jan directed her energies full-time to learning about and funding promising neuropsychiatric research.
