A 27-year-old entrepreneur who featured in Forbes’ 30 Under 30 list in 2025 has been sentenced to 25 months in prison in the US for defrauding investors of approximately $7 million. Gökçe Güven, founder and CEO of New York -based technology startup Kalder Inc., pleaded guilty to securities fraud after misleading investors about the company’s revenue, business partnerships and financial performance.
She also submitted reference letters purportedly signed by business executives. However, investigators found that Güven had digitally signed the letters herself without the executives’ knowledge or consent. Apart from defrauding investors, Güven also made false statements and submitted fabricated documents as part of her US visa application. After her student visa expired, Kalder sponsored her application for an O-1A visa, which is generally issued to individuals with extraordinary ability in fields such as science, education, business and athletics. Her visa application repeated several of the claims she had made to investors about Kalder’s business performance.
Güven, a Turkish citizen based in New York, pleaded guilty to one count of securities fraud on May 15, 2026, according to the US Attorney’s Office. Along with the prison sentence, she has been ordered to pay $6,717,997 each in forfeiture and restitution to her victims. In April 2024, she began raising funds for the company’s seed round by approaching dozens of venture capital investors. Kalder’s pitch deck also falsely claimed that Kalder’s recurring revenue had increased steadily month after month, reaching $1.2 million in annual recurring revenue. She was granted an O-1A visa in the fall of 2025, but it has since been revoked.
Güven founded Kalder, a technology startup focused on business loyalty and rewards programmes, according to a press release . However, according to the US Attorney’s Office, some of these brands had only entered into limited pilot programmes, often at heavily discounted rates, while others had no agreement with the company at all.
