The Chameleon Founder Jeff Yan’s Twitter handle is @chameleon_jeff, and it isn’t a metaphor. He genuinely admires chameleons—creatures that can swivel each eye independently, anchor three limbs forward and one backward, and flick a tongue faster than a fighter jet’s ejection seat. “They’re basically aliens on Earth,” he says. That fascination is a cipher for the man himself: a physics prodigy who, with zero venture capital and a staff you could fit in a minivan, quietly built one of the large...

The Chameleon Founder Jeff Yan’s Twitter handle is @chameleon_jeff, and it isn’t a metaphor. He genuinely admires chameleons—creatures that can swivel each eye independently, anchor three limbs forward and one backward, and flick a tongue faster than a fighter jet’s ejection seat. “They’re basically aliens on Earth,” he says. That fascination is a cipher for the man himself: a physics prodigy who, with zero venture capital and a staff you could fit in a minivan, quietly built one of the large...