Meta has bought Sundial, an AI-powered data analytics platform. A company spokesperson confirmed the deal to Axios.
The twist is that Sundial’s founders used to work at Meta. They left, built a company, and now they’re coming back with it.
What Meta is getting
Sundial was co-founded in 2021 by Chandra Narayanan and Julie Zhuo, both former Meta executives. The startup builds self-service analytics tools for businesses.
Its pitch combines three ingredients: AI, contextual data, and what the company calls expert playbooks. The goal is to help enterprises make decisions faster without routing every question through a data team.
The startup raised $23 million in total funding. The largest piece was a $16 million Series A in July 2025, led by DJ Patil of GPV.
Sequoia Capital also backed the company, alongside other investors.
Sundial’s client list includes OpenAI.
In April 2026, Sundial also joined the Open Semantic Interchange initiative, an effort led by Snowflake. The initiative aims to standardize how data metrics are defined across AI tools.
Where Sundial lands inside Meta
Sundial won’t operate as a standalone product line. It will be absorbed into Meta’s new data analytics organization.
That detail came from a LinkedIn post by Alex Schultz, who leads the unit. The deal was reported by Axios on October 23, 2026.
Axios framed the acquisition as part of a broader push. Meta is putting more resources into its data and analytics team as AI drives enormous demand for insights.
For the founders, the move closes a loop. Narayanan and Zhuo spent time inside Meta, left to build their own company, and are now returning with a product designed around the problems they likely saw firsthand.
What this means
For Meta, the acquisition is less about selling a new product and more about sharpening its internal decision-making. Sundial is going into an internal analytics organization, not onto a public storefront.
The OpenAI relationship raises an open question. Sundial counted one of Meta’s AI competitors as a client, and it’s not clear from the reporting what happens to existing customer relationships now that the startup sits inside Meta.
The Snowflake-led Open Semantic Interchange membership is another thread to follow. Sundial joined an industry effort built around interoperability.
Sundial raised $23 million and attracted backers like Sequoia Capital and GPV. Its exit to Meta gives those investors a resolution, and it gives other AI-focused analytics startups a reference point for where their own paths could lead.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Diego Almada Lopez. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.