AI Talent Platform Dex Hires Founders of Secret Escapes and Progression
Dex, a London-based AI recruitment platform for software engineers, has brought on board two former founders in senior roles. Tom Valentine, co-founder of travel deals site Secret Escapes, joins as chief operating officer (COO), while Jonny Burch, co-founder of career development platform Progression, takes the role of head of design.
Paddy Lambros, Founder and CEO of Dex, expressed his enthusiasm for the new team members:
"Tom and Jonny have built businesses around problems that matter deeply to Dex, namely, how to scale a marketplace and how to help people build better careers. They’re joining our already world-class team to tackle those challenges head-on."
Tom Valentine's Background
Valentine co-founded Secret Escapes in 2010 and later held positions as executive chairman and COO at Fyxer AI, a startup developing an AI executive assistant. He reflects on the difficulties of hiring engineers:
"Hiring engineers has been the hardest part of my job for about 20 years. In that time, I’ve seen all sorts of propositions to improve the experience for candidates and companies come and go."
"AI now makes it possible to understand a candidate beyond a specific role in a way that just wasn’t previously possible. This is where the opportunity to build a truly candidate-centric recruitment business lies."
As COO at Dex, Valentine will oversee commercial work and growth for the platform's core marketplace, matching engineers with employers. He also aims to explore expansions into other roles and career stages.
Jonny Burch's Vision
Burch co-founded Progression, a startup that assists companies in building career and skills frameworks, backed by LocalGlobe, Connect Ventures, and Village Global. The company was acquired by Careerminds in 2024. He shares his design philosophy:
"Although I’m a designer, I’m still a founder at heart. I love early-stage teams, difficult problems, and the autonomy to solve them. I want us to build a product so good that candidates recommend it because of the experience itself."
At Dex, Burch will assemble the design team and lead the candidate-facing product.
Dex's AI Approach
Dex leverages AI through its "talent agent" which chats with engineers about their skills, experiences, and goals before matching them with jobs. The platform utilizes AI models from Google, Anthropic, and OpenAI.
In April, Dex secured a $5.3 million seed round led by Notion Capital, as reported by Tech.eu, with investors backing other AI recruiting tools.
Paddy Lambros, who previously led early-stage talent teams at Atomico and Improbable, believes startups benefit from hiring former founders:
"AI agents are expanding what leaner teams can achieve at a staggering rate. This means that the ability to decide what needs doing, get it moving quickly, and take responsibility for the result, makes human agency all the more valuable in today’s workplace."