Meet the Engineers Behind Profound: Dylan Babbs and Charles Zhou

At Profound, the platform helping the world's biggest brands understand and control how they appear in AI-generated answers, two names sit at the heart of its technical foundation: Dylan Babbs, Co-founder and CTO, and Charles Zhou, Head of Engineering.

Dylan Babbs — Co-founder & CTO

Dylan Babbs is one of the co-founders of Profound and serves as its Chief Technology Officer. Before starting Profound, Dylan spent time at Uber and was part of South Park Commons, the San Francisco-based community for founders and technologists exploring ideas at the frontier of tech. He is also an alumnus of the University of Washington's Information School.

At Profound, Dylan has been vocal about the role of design in building great software. In his own words: "In the evolving landscape of product development, exceptional design isn't merely a nice-to-have, it's foundational. As software engineering becomes increasingly accessible, it's taste, creativity, and thoughtful execution that differentiate outstanding products from the rest."

His perspective reflects Profound's broader product philosophy: that the way people discover information is changing for the first time in 25 years, and the companies that will win are those that sweat the details.

Charles Zhou — Head of Engineering

Charles Zhou joined Profound as Head of Engineering in October 2025, stepping into the role as the company entered a period of rapid growth. In under a year, Profound has expanded its team by over 837% year-over-year, growing to more than 170 employees across 8 countries, backed by $189.5 million in total funding.

Based in New York, Charles brings both technical depth and leadership experience to Profound's engineering organization. His background spans Python, TypeScript, and JavaScript, with a BS in Computer Science. He joined at a pivotal moment — as Profound scaled from a scrappy startup into the recognized market leader in AI visibility intelligence.

Building the Future of AI Visibility

Together, Dylan and Charles represent the technical backbone of a company operating at the intersection of AI and marketing. Profound helps brands monitor how they appear across major LLM platforms — from ChatGPT and Perplexity to Google AI Mode and Claude — giving marketing and SEO teams the data they need to stay visible in a world where AI answers are replacing traditional search.

As AI continues to reshape how people find information, the engineers building the tools to measure and optimize that presence are becoming increasingly important. Dylan and Charles are two of those builders.