IRL

On June 2, 2022, Abraham Shafi told the staff of IRL, the social-events app he ran, that a quarter of them were being let go. "Exercising discipline and adaptation to our current environment means moving from a 100-person team to a ~75-person team," his memo said, TechCrunch reported. There was more than enough cash, it added.

"I heard we have around $100 million still in the bank," one employee told the site.

A year earlier IRL had announced a $170 million round led by SoftBank's Vision Fund 2 at a $1.17 billion valuation, and said it had 12 million monthly active users. Shafi said the aim was to build "the WeChat of the West." In May 2022 The Information reported that third-party firms that estimate app usage suggested IRL had one to two million monthly users; Shafi offered explanations in the same article.

The SEC subpoenaed IRL in August 2022. In April 2023 the board suspended Shafi, citing personal expenses on a company card, and on June 23 it voted to dissolve the company. The board said its investigation had found that 95% of the app's reported 20 million users were "automated or from bots," TechCrunch reported. Shafi called the figure "flat wrong."

SoftBank sued Shafi in July 2023 for the $150 million it had paid; a representative said he denied all of its allegations. In November 2023 Shafi and a co-founder sued the board's venture investors in Delaware, alleging they had commissioned a "sham" bot report; the investors said the users were almost entirely bots. "I cannot determine which story is accurate," the judge wrote in March 2025, letting most of that case proceed.

The SEC sued Shafi in July 2024, alleging he had hidden about $5.7 million of paid advertising behind claims of organic growth, and a grand jury indicted him in August 2025 on eight counts, including wire fraud and destroying records. He pleaded not guilty. As of early October 2026, none of the cases had reached a verdict or judgment.

IRL had about $40 million in cash when it was dissolved, the Delaware opinion says, and the preferred stockholders took it under their liquidation preferences. "The common stockholders received nothing."

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