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Travel company WanderOn has raised Rs 54 crore in a Series A round led by DSG Consumer Partners and CAAF, marking one of the largest institutional investments in India’s travel and experiences sector.The company plans to use the new capital to expand its destination portfolio and scale categories that are seeing increased demand, including adventure, sports-focused and wellness travel. It also aims to strengthen its technology infrastructure to streamline the customer journey, from discovery and planning to booking and on-ground coordination. “Travel today is about connection, people want trips where they can meet like-minded travellers and feel part of something meaningful. We have built WanderOn around that belief. This fundraise gives us the ability to move faster on destinations, product innovation, and technology, while continuing to put the traveller experience at the centre of everything we do,” Govind Gaur, CEO, WanderOn, said.(L-R) Ravi khokhar (CTO), Co-founder Chirag jain (COO), Co-founder Govind Gaur (Founder, CEO) Madhusudhan Jaju (CFO), Co-founderPrior to the funding, the company had crossed Rs 100 crore in revenue as a bootstrapped business and recorded year-on-year doubling of growth in the post-pandemic period.“By strengthening our digital capabilities, we aim to reach travellers across the country, offering a seamless, intuitive…  ​Read More​YourStory RSS Feed

For decades, ambition in India seemed to have a postcode. Big ideas belonged to metro cities. Startups were expected to grow out of glass offices, co-working spaces, and pitch decks presented in English-laced boardrooms. If you weren’t building from Bengaluru, Mumbai, Delhi, or Hyderabad, you were often seen as early, small, or temporary.But something has changed, quietly.Across Tier II and Tier III cities, and even deeper into towns and semi-rural regions, a new kind of entrepreneurship is taking root. It doesn’t chase headlines or hashtags. It doesn’t announce funding rounds or growth targets on LinkedIn. Instead, it grows steadily, supported by local demand, grounded in real problems, and powered by founders who value sustainability over spectacle.This is quiet entrepreneurship, where businesses are built without external validation, but with deep local relevance. And it is reshaping India’s economic landscape far from the metro spotlight.What quiet entrepreneurship really meansQuiet entrepreneurship is not about staying small—it’s about staying intentional.These founders are not uninterested in growth; they are selective about it. Their businesses focus on profitability, community trust, and long-term stability rather than rapid scale or investor attention.Common characteristics include:Bootstrapped or family-funded operationsStrong local customer basesLow burn, high involvement by foundersGrowth measured in years,…  ​Read More​YourStory RSS Feed

Swiggy’s Food Marketplace CEO Rohit Kapoor said the company is increasingly using generative AI across its operations, offering 'democratised intelligence' to stakeholders ranging from the leadership team to restaurant partners and delivery workers. Speaking to PTI at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting, Kapoor said its AI systems are already 'quite evolved'.“For example, somebody calls customer service, and I have the ability through Gen AI to understand the quality of that discussion, and I can do something about it immediately. That's a power that Gen AI is unleashing,” he said. According to him, AI tools now help restaurants track dish-level performance, assist delivery partners with insights on high-demand areas, and provide leadership with real-time business updates. He added that robotics also supports internal functions such as warehouse operations.On drone delivery, Kapoor said the technology remains at an experimental stage despite ongoing pilots. He noted that drones can reach designated drop points but struggle with last-mile requirements. “It can go to one place or one position, but you need your food at your doorstep. Those are the questions which will need to be answered first,” he said, adding that broader adoption will depend on cost efficiencies over time.Kapoor described India’s food…  ​Read More​YourStory RSS Feed

Cashfree Payments has launched an employee stock option (ESOP) buyback covering over 400 current and former employees, as the payments firm marks a decade since it was founded.The ESOP buyback includes 175 former employees, and comes as the Bengaluru-based company moves into a new 80,000-square-foot headquarters at Ecoworld, a large business park in the city. Cashfree did not disclose the size of the buyback."As a company that has always put employee wellbeing first, we see ESOPs not merely as a retention tool or a future promise, but as a tangible way to participate in wealth creation and ownership," said Akash Sinha, CEO & Co-founder, Cashfree Payments. "Whether someone is building with us today or helped lay the foundation in our early years, this buyback is about recognising real contribution and sharing the outcomes of growth. As we continue to scale India’s payments and identity infrastructure, our commitment remains to build a company where progress and prosperity are shared," he added. Also ReadCashfree launches agentic payments to complete purchases inside AI chatFounded in 2015, Cashfree Payments provides payment processing and identity verification services to businesses in India. The company said it processes more than $80 billion in annual payment volumes and…  ​Read More​YourStory RSS Feed

In a year where AI is no longer just accelerating innovation but redefining leadership itself—from how enterprises are built to how intelligence is embedded into everyday decision-making—keeping pace with true AI-native thinkers is the real challenge. That’s where AI100 steps in. The 7th cohort brings together a powerful mix of investors, enterprise leaders, founders, and technologists who are not merely adopting AI, but reshaping its role across capital, industry, platforms, and culture.United by the belief that AI must be purposeful, responsible, and deeply human-centric, the 7th cohort reflects India’s growing voice in shaping global AI narratives - where technology is not a bolt-on, but a force multiplier, an enabler, and amplifier of true human potential.Harsh VardhanStanding at the forefront of AI-driven smart manufacturing is Harsh Vardhan, Global Head of Digital Innovation, AI, Industry 4.0 & Innovation Culture at Apollo Tyres. This transformational leader began his AI journey during his engineering years at NIT. Initially, his interest in technology stayed firmly within the confines of textbooks and academia. However, working in the fintech sector on analytics-led credit solutions for financial inclusion turned a theoretical interest into practical application and appreciation. In the last two decades, Vardhan has used his passion for…  ​Read More​YourStory RSS Feed

Poorvi Vijay, Principal Investor at Elevation Capital, first encountered artificial intelligence as an undergraduate at IIT Guwahati, where she specialized in design and human-computer interaction. Her early projects, ranging from wearable computing to XR/AR technologies, sparked a curiosity about how technology could amplify the human experience. That curiosity evolved into a vocation. After completing her undergrad, she joined Amazon India, working on retail and international expansion, before moving to the UK to join the Alexa speech team around 2016–17. It was here, while building voice-interactive systems and exploring how tone, emotion, and personality shape digital companions, that she entered the world of conversational AI.It was the beginning of an ongoing journey. As AI evolved from rule-based systems to the generative, transformative models of today, Vijay’s fascination only deepened. After completing her MBA at Harvard Business School, she joined Elevation Capital and her focus on SaaS soon intersected with the growing momentum around AI. It was the right place at the right time, she says. At Elevation Capital, she has witnessed the technology move from experimental promise to a powerful, human-centered force reshaping industries - and everyday life.Elevating enterprises from AI-enabled to AI nativeAt Elevation Capital, Vijay highlights how backing category-defining…  ​Read More​YourStory RSS Feed

Like many computer science engineers, Avinash Naik of Bajaj General Insurance began his career motivated by the desire to build something meaningful. His early years in IT services taught him how to solve problems at scale, but the real spark was kindled by collaborating with peers who were constantly experimenting with emerging technologies. This culture of curiosity laid the foundation of his interest in innovation. As Naik transitioned from IT services to the business world, he found the freedom to experiment on a broader canvas. In 2014-2015, he began his first hands-on project with AI, using open-source tools for Optical Character Recognition (OCR) and early speech-to-text applications. “Those were early years, but they laid the foundation for what was to come,” he reflects. As AI evolved, he witnessed its reach: changing industries and enterprises in its wake. In 2016, when Naik joined the Bajaj Finserv Group’s corporate strategy function, he reported directly to the Group Head of Strategy, which gave him a front-row seat to how innovation could drive business transformation. “Innovation till then was a very inward-looking thing... what Bajaj taught me was to take an outside-in view,” he says.At Bajaj, Naik was a key player in shaping the group’s innovation…  ​Read More​YourStory RSS Feed

Harsh Vardhan, Global Head of Digital Innovation, AI, Industry 4.0, and Innovation Culture at Apollo Tyres, first encountered artificial intelligence during his engineering studies at NIT. Back then, it was little more than an academic concept confined to textbooks. His interests at the time lay in coding and large mainframe systems rather than in machines that could mimic human thought.After graduation, he began his career in IT within the banking and financial services sector. Expecting to work on transactional systems using COBOL and JCL, he instead joined Compute Credit, a fintech credit card provider, where he was introduced to data warehousing, mining, and business intelligence. Analysing vast datasets to identify patterns and behaviours, he helped to build solutions for subprime and non-prime customers. Early analytics and machine learning techniques were applied to drive financial inclusion — a practical, real-world use of AI that would shape his professional outlook.What began as a detour from his plan became the foundation of his career in analytics. He saw firsthand how data-driven insights and pattern recognition could reshape decision-making and customer experience. AI had moved from theory to impact — and he was hooked.Today, with over two decades of experience, Vardhan leads Apollo Tyres’…  ​Read More​YourStory RSS Feed

Karthikeyan Krishnaswamy, Co-founder and CTO, KreditBee, grew interested in boundary-pushing, future-ready technologies long before formal education. His fascination was sparked by the stores of science fiction and frames of Japanese anime. From Isaac Asimov’s sentient robot Daneel Olivaw to the cybernetic worlds of Ghost in the Shell, he was captivated by the possibilities of intelligent systems. At college, his curiosity evolved into research in computer vision and natural language processing, where he worked with small datasets and statistical models like Hidden Markov Model (HMM) for object and face recognition – the building blocks of today’s deep learning revolution.If science fiction shaped his imagination, his hometown, Tirupur, the “Dollar City”, shaped his ambition. Growing up amid its energetic entrepreneurial culture, Krishnaswamy developed a strong business instinct early on. That drive matured during his college years at NUS, where he joined a startup founded by his seniors, later managing acquisitions in Bangalore and forming lasting connections with future co-founders Madhusudan Ekambaram and Vivek Veda.How Kreditbee came to beKreditBee, originally known as KrazyBee, began with a simple but powerful mission: to give students easier access to credit. The idea grew out of Krishnaswamy’s own circle — friends and cousins in college who struggled…  ​Read More​YourStory RSS Feed

As a newly minted entrepreneur, Varun Mayya approached startups with a technology-first lens and honed that approach over the next decade. Now, with 13 years of experience, he’s shifted to a problem-statement focus. The right solution, he believes, could leverage technology, human effort, or clever business models to address the core issue. Mayya co-founded Aeos in 2022 with his wife Achina Mayya, a Bengaluru-based bootstrapped media-tech company.​ Aeos serves B2B clients like Redbull, Amazon Prime, and IPL teams.​ Its closed-loop model integrates content creation, distribution, talent scouting, and GenAI tools for scalable operations.He began by targeting the problem of videos, with an aim to focus on video games later. His team pursued every avenue: business model innovations, manual hiring, or tech solutions. This flexibility allowed the problem to be attacked by multiple vectors, an approach that transformed everything.In just the last month, Mayya’s bootstrapped company Aeos achieved over a billion views with a staff of 500 employees. “We have much higher margins than a traditional video services company - almost 3 to 4x. But the minute you start using technology, the minute you start using AI, you have better margins.”Inside Mayya’s mind: the entrepreneurEvery time Mayya heads to work, he’s an…  ​Read More​YourStory RSS Feed