Former Army Rangers Matt Thompson, 34, and Blake Hall, 32, are helping people prove their identity online to access exclusive discounts and services, while also protecting their personal information. The company, which has raised $16M, launched the service on partner websites in late 2012 and has expanded it from members of the military to all Internet users. The 54-person company recently won a GSA contract to improve citizen access to digital government applications through ID.me credentials. Before launching the company, Matt was in the military for 11 years and served in four combat deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Blake was an Army captain, attended Harvard Business School and spent a summer working for McKinsey.

What you didn’t know about Matt and Blake:

• Matt is a private pilot and flies to relax and clear his head.

• He was an Army Ranger and doing crazy things was his job.

• He became a father in May and has learned having a baby is like launching a whole new startup. 

• Blake is the first Google result for the phrase “muscly entrepreneur.”

• Arnold Schwarzenegger has written to him three times.

• He met the POTUS while wearing shorts.

• The worst 30-second pitch he ever gave was inside an actual elevator.
  
  

• He also became a father recently and his little girl is the best thing ever to happen to him and his wife.