A gripping account of PayPal’s origins and a vivid portrait of the geeks and contrarians who made its meteoric rise possible. His richly reported narrative includes corporate intrigue, workplace hijinks, breakthrough innovation and first-class nerdiness.

The development of online “wallets” might seem particularly bloodless...and yet The Founders is an intensely magnetic chronicle in which ambitions and emotions run as red-hot as they did in the Facebook movie written by Aaron Sorkin, The Social Network. It helps that PayPal’s origin story...features two of the more complicated antiheroes of our time: Peter Thiel...and Elon Musk.

Well-researched.

Elon Musk can be a vulnerable person. That’s one of the surprising insights from a new book about the founding of PayPal.

This deep dive into PayPal’s history will intrigue readers from the beginning.

Soni excels at weaving together the nitty-gritty details of PayPal’s early days, as told by the people who were directly involved. He allows readers to feel like they are caught up in the action.

[A] punchy origin story full of wheeling, dealing, and political machinations.

Combining historical detail with biographical perspective, Soni sifts through PayPal alumni to reveal the company’s origins and the risks it took to surpass both its predecessors and contemporary competition. He seamlessly chronicles the early years of driven entrepreneurs like Peter Thiel, Max Levchin, Reid Hoffman, and Elon Musk.