Nikhil Makkar

Founding Engineer @ AuricAI; Prev: PhD @PurdueEngineers, GeoAI @ORNL, @UHouston.

[Nikhil Makkar @MakkarNik]

What are they even comparing?

[Rajan Anandan @RajanAnandan]

.@sarvam Coding Agent

[Nikhil Makkar @MakkarNik]

@andrewmccalip Wow! Didn't change a thing.

[Naga Bharath Daka @bharathdaka]

After years of staying mostly silent here, I wanted to share what this moment truly means for us.

Reaching orbit with Vikram-1 is the culmination of an incredibly long and difficult journey. Over the last few years, Team Skyroot pushed relentlessly through missed aggressive deadlines, technical hurdles, and moments when the finish line kept moving. We never lost hope. Not once.

This success feels like redemption for every late night, every difficult choice, and every person who refused to give up on the dream.

The flight has given us a treasure of high-fidelity data. We will use every bit of it to make our vehicle subsystems significantly more robust and to optimize performance across the entire system.

For any launch company, achieving orbit is the single hardest milestone. Productionizing this capability, turning this success into reliable, repeatable flights, is now our central focus.

To every member of Team Skyroot who carried this dream when it was hardest, and to everyone who stood with us through the quiet years: thank you. This is your victory too.

To the entire nation that has celebrated this achievement with so much warmth and pride, thank you! It has meant more to us than words can express.

The real work begins now. 🚀

@SkyrootA

[Nikhil Makkar @MakkarNik]

@ShekharGupta Only research not rockets. They should go NASA route and focus on open Science and leave the rockets and payload launches to private sector (in time)

[Nikhil Makkar @MakkarNik]

@protosphinx Agar kisi ne fir se bola ki movie ke budget me hamne Mars mission kara diya, do thappad lagao!

[Nikhil Makkar @MakkarNik]

WHITE F-ING PILLED!

[Nikhil Makkar @MakkarNik]

@fikocian The ghosts of Galaxeye are not far!

[Nikhil Makkar @MakkarNik]

@dharmeshba Thinking that 'these banks' will answer your questions is another kind of delusion. Only reason is mistrust in private banks because of some past trauma of failure.

[Nikhil Makkar @MakkarNik]

@protosphinx He should have lassi instead of jalebi. So much better.

[Nikhil Makkar @MakkarNik]

Awesome 😎

[Normal Guy @Normal_2610]

India opened space to private companies in 2020, Government promoted startups, gave them access to ISRO infrastructure, transferred SSLV rocket technology to HAL

Private space companies went from 11 in 2019 to over 400 by 2024, Space startup funding crossed 147 million dollars in FY2025-26 alone. Now same government issues memo saying scientists cannot resign from Gaganyaan till mission is done.

You created competing market, funded it, celebrated it Then try to trap people from joining it, Fix is not restriction, Fix is better pay.

Meanwhile around 120 scientists working on key missions walked out in past year. ISRO has 1,050 vacant scientific positions it cannot fill fast enough.

When people who held deep mission specific knowledge leave and replacements do not come in at same rate, missions start failing

ISRO pays entry level scientist about 72,000 rupees per month in hand. Senior scientist with 20 years maxes around 2 lakh with all allowances. Aditya Rallapalli ran simulation team that generated 25 terabytes of data validating Chandrayaan 3 moon landing, He quit.

Skyroot founders who left ISRO in 2018 hold combined 2,440 crore in billion dollar company. Startup employees with stock options can earn more in one IPO or buyout than ISRO pays over full career.

Cadre review added 460 posts, Changes nothing when private pay runs multiples higher.

[Nassim Nicholas Taleb @nntaleb]

Mistakes are bad; defending them is worse. It's better for you to be the one correcting them than others. Being self-correcting is #antifragile.
A clear conscience is invaluable.

[Nikhil Makkar @MakkarNik]

@Kulfei @trdessai Because they are!

[Nikhil Makkar @MakkarNik]

@goth600 Or any law! (Doesn't mean you don't have to follow them)

[isaac @theisaacmed]

One of our younger team members has business ambitions and asked me for my top pieces of advice.

I wrote him a few paragraphs.

[Nikita Bier @nikitabier]

X App (Formerly Twitter), Acquired by xAI, a Product by SpaceXAI, a division of SpaceX

[Nikhil Makkar @MakkarNik]

@PalmerLuckey Strange how incentives work!

[Stoolies Clubhouse 🏴‍☠️ @StooliesClub]

The only funny skit SNL has had in 20 years thanks to the legend @natebargatze:

#America250

[Shane Parrish @shaneparrish]

Jim Rohn on remembering the basics:

[Nikhil Makkar @MakkarNik]

@kmr_dilip Good then!

[Ronit Pereira @CAronitpereira]

Charlie Munger and Warren Buffett on Ethanol blending in Petrol:

“Ethanol blending is a very stupid way to try and solve an energy problem.”

“It takes more fossil fuel energy to create ethanol than you can get out of ethanol you’ve created.”

- Charlie Munger. 2006.