Charlie Javice, founder of the financial aid startup Frank and Forbes 30 under 30 alumnus, has been sentenced to seven years in prison for fraud.
The fintech startup had been acquired by JPMorgan Chase in 2021 for $175 million. The bank later accused Javice of lying about its customer base; the founder claimed the company had 4 million customers, when it actually had 300,000. Evidently, JPMorgan Chase did not do its due diligence before agreeing to buy Frank.
During the trial, former Frank engineer Patrick Vovor testified that Javice had asked him to create fake user data prior to the sale; when he declined, Javice asked math professor and data scientist Adam Kapelner for help creating synthetic data. Kapelner provided key testimony for the prosecution.
Along with her co-defendant, Frank’s chief growth officer Olivier Amar, Javice will be responsible for paying $278.5 million in restitution.
