Founder Mission
We believe life should be more social again.
Joya started from a simple belief: meeting people should not feel awkward, random, or impossible to organise. We are building a new kind of social platform that helps people turn intentions into real-life moments.
Personal Origin
The idea came from years of seeing how naturally people connect when the context is right.
When travelling, in hostels, on pub crawls, at house parties, and crew-life, talking to new people feels normal because everyone understands the situation. We wanted to bring that same social permission into everyday life.
Founders
Built by people who have lived and understood the problem.
Johannes Burkhart, Co-Founder & CEO
Johannes leads the vision, rollout, partnerships, and real-world side of Joya. After travelling to more than 90 countries and staying in over 200 hostels, he became deeply interested in why meeting people feels natural in some places and almost impossible in others. His background in biomedicine, public health operations, and startup commercialization shapes how Joya connects human behaviour with real-world execution.
Dr. Michael Jury, Co-Founder & CTO
Mike makes the vision a reality by leading the technology, architecture, and AI orchestration behind Joya. With a PhD in molecular materials and experience building complex data-driven systems, he is responsible for turning social intent into a system that can actually match people, coordinate moments, and learn from real-world outcomes.
Why us
We built Joya because we believe technology should not replace real life. It should help people find their way back into it. We know what it feels like when social life becomes harder to organize, when cities are full of people but connection still feels strangely hidden, and we believe the right technology can make openness visible again. What if an app’s highest purpose was to get you off the app?
Now launching
We are going city by city: Starting with Mainz.
The first version of Joya is being shaped with early members, local communities, and the moments people are already looking for. Join the waitlist to help define what comes next.