Early Days

David Holz grew up in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

He studied Math and Physics at UNC Chapel Hill, then started a PhD in Applied Mathematics.

He never finished it. While he was still enrolled he was already doing research work on the side, imaging and computer vision projects, a NASA Langley project involving LiDAR. None of it was leading toward an academic career. It was leading toward a problem he couldn't stop thinking about

why do we still control computers with a mouse and a keyboard?

Leap Motion

In 2010 he dropped the PhD path for good and co-founded Leap Motion with Michael Buckwald.

Holz, as CTO, led the engineering behind the company's hand-tracking technology. The small sensor could detect tiny finger movements in midair with surprising precision, making it possible to control software using natural gestures. It was one of the first consumer devices that showed this idea could actually work outside a research lab.

The technology attracted a huge amount of attention. Leap Motion raised around $94 million from investors and partnered with several hardware companies as virtual and augmented reality started gaining momentum. While gesture-controlled computing didn't replace the mouse the way Holz had hoped, the company's research became an important part of the VR industry. In 2019, Leap Motion was acquired by Ultrahaptics, which later rebranded as Ultraleap.

Starting Midjourney

More than a decade after founding Leap Motion, Holz started another company, but this time he took a completely different approach. Midjourney quietly appeared in 2021 without a splashy launch event, venture capital announcement, or marketing campaign. A small team focused almost entirely on building the product instead of promoting it.

The first version lived inside Discord, which turned out to be a smart decision. People could simply type a short text prompt, wait a few seconds, and watch an image appear. There was no complicated software to install or design skills required. That simplicity made it easy for artists, hobbyists, and complete beginners to experiment together in public channels.

As users shared their creations across social media, Midjourney spread almost entirely through word of mouth. The community itself became the company's biggest marketing engine, helping it grow far faster than a traditional software launch could have.

Going Beyond Images

In June 2025, Midjourney shipped its first video model, letting people animate a still image straight from Discord.

Again in June 2026, the company also announced its first hardware project, Midjourney Medical, a Full Body Ultrasonic Computational Tomography scanner debuting in a San Francisco spa.

Entering spaces more than just the AI race.