Apoorv Ujjwal

Avid Reader ||Learner|| Loves Tea

[Muthukrishnan Dhandapani @dmuthuk]

I feel Sridhar Vembu could meet the Chief Minister and share his views on developing Tamil Nadu.

Whether through creating huge employment opportunities in rural Tamil Nadu or through extensive social work, Sridhar has contributed significantly to both the state and the nation.

With his resources and expertise, if he focuses on any key area for the state's progress, it would be a great step forward.

[🚨Indian Gems @IndianGems_]

"No delay in registering FIRs, Take decisions according to law, no one should interfere even if it is me."

— CM Thalapathy Vijay to IAS officers

[Gabbar @GabbbarSingh]

It’s the Suryavanshi curse. The stars of this kid are so strong, that if you try to eclipse him, it will burn you. Gambhir feeling singed. Team tottering while chasing a modest total against a minnow.

[Gabbar @GabbbarSingh]

Europe is beating India in two things India was good at:

Cricket & Summers.

[vir sanghvi @virsanghvi]

It’s 34 degrees in London & Brits are burning; rail tracks melting,restaurants turning off fryers etc.
As my wife asked : how did these wimps manage to rule super hot India for so long in their heavy uniforms & elaborate tailcoats?
This is cooler than Indian summers

[Kailash Gahlot @kgahlot]

With immense pride and gratitude, we share that our younger daughter, Devina Gahlot, has secured All India Rank 1 in CUET (UG ) - 2026, achieving the highest aggregate NTA score in the country.

This remarkable achievement reflects her hard work, discipline, perseverance and unwavering commitment to excellence.

A note of gratitude to her teachers, mentors and the entire Delhi Public School, Vasant Kunj community, for inspiring her curiosity, nurturing her potential and guiding her; to the unwavering support of my wife, Moushumi, and the constant encouragement of her elder sister, Jahnavi, both of whom have been her pillars of strength throughout.

Congratulations, Devina. Watching your dreams take shape through dedication and hard work has been truly special, and we are immensely proud of you !

May you continue to learn, grow and achieve greater heights with humility and purpose.

[🚨Indian Gems @IndianGems_]

"My golden life advice to kids: Do whatever the hell you want but don’t you dare leave India."

— Nithin Kamath, CEO Zerodha

[Akshat Shrivastava @Akshat_World]

India needs more people like @kunalb11

10 years ago, Entrepreneurship in India was looked down upon.

Don't trust me? ask your elder brother/sister/parents: what people thought of entrepreneurs? It was hard for entrepreneurs to even get married 😅

[Why? because everyone thought that Entrepreneurship was a waste of time]

People like Kunal Shah changed that narrative.
We live in a very different India now in 2025: where Entrepreneurship is celebrated. The culture of risk taking is finding its feet.

Fine, he has built loss making firms. But, someone needs to show courage to take risks. And, change the status quo.

He did exactly that.

[Chandra R. Srikanth @chandrarsrikant]

Omg omg omg
Meta Investment in CRED is now confirmed and Kunal Shah will be heading WhatsApp globally
We got the story, permutations and synergy right
@Goenka_Tushar1 and I worked and worked and worked the phones to confirm this
Finally both of us prayed fervently and published
So thankful to our sources and the Lord above.

[Bhavya Arora @bhavyaroar]

Kunal Shah is that one guy whose private number circulates freely in founder circles, and he cares to reply and share feedback as well. He alone has done so much for Indian startup ecosytem that no one could even come close

[Rohan N. Murty @RohanMurty]

Last week, Prof. Srinivasan at @HarvardHBS taught a case study about our company (Workfabric AI), and 80+ senior executives spent nearly two and a half hours debating it.

The case, written by Professor Suraj Srinivasan and George Gonzalez, is titled "Workfabric AI: AI Twins for the Enterprise". George Nychis, Nash Sabti, Shreyas Karanth, and I were lucky to be in the room as a class of accomplished leaders dug into the ideas we care about most.

What can you actually build an AI twin from - a salesperson, an account, a product, a whole team? How do twins let an organization do things it simply can't today, like surfacing revenue no single person could see? And underneath all of it, how does context, the lived reality of how people actually work, make any of this possible?

Part of this entire discussion was about how humans, how we live and work, are the biggest untapped source of context for AI. And the role our platform ContextFabric plays in making this coming alive.

For a company just over a year old, watching a room of this caliber engage this seriously with our work was exciting. The questions were sharper than any pitch meeting we've had. The hardest ones will stay with us for months. And the fact that none of it was solicited made the validation mean that much more.

Thank you, Professor Srinivasan and George Gonzalez, for the rigor and care you brought to the case. Thank you to the students who brought their toughest questions.

And thank you to the @workfabricai team. Every one of you who helped turn an idea into something worth teaching.

[Piyu @PiyuduttaPiyu]

Kunal Shah is going to lead WhatsApp globally.
No IIT. No IIM.
His CV wouldn't have made it past the Indian corporate HR system :)
The West bets on builders, while Indian corporates still rely on IIT/IIM badges.

[Chandra R. Srikanth @chandrarsrikant]

Leave Cred aside for a moment
A startup founder from India will now lead WhatsApp globally
Unprecedented

[Gokul Rajaram @gokulr]

Meta’s hiring of @kunalb11 to run WhatsApp is almost unprecedented in their bringing a leader from outside Silicon Valley to run a global product. And this wasn’t a straightforward hire either. Meta is paying $1b for the privilege of hiring him.

The only comparable I can think of among tech companies is Apple hiring Angela Ahrendts (CEO of Burberry) to run Retail. Other than that hire, every product / business leadership role at the best tech companies has been filled from people in the Valley, if not the US.

This is a great win for:
- WhatsApp users, who will benefit from a leader who has a native and deep understanding of - and facility with - the product.
- Meta, who gets one of the best global consumer product thinkers and builders for their crown jewel product.
- The Indian / global product talent ecosystem, which will be inspired by seeing that you don’t need to be in Silicon Valley to lead a global product, that forward thinking tech / AI companies will stretch to get the best leaders from anywhere in the world.

@Jessicalessin the story behind Kunal’s hire will be fascinating to break.

[Vineeth K @DealsDhamaka]

Kunal Shah to become global CEO of WhatsApp

Woahhh ! This is a person staying in Bengaluru, India cracked a Global CEO Role... what an amazing feat.

Starting from founder of PaisaBack, Freecharge, and CRED to Global CEO of whatsapp at the age of 42 ! Kudos man ... Inspiring.

[Kunal Shah @kunalb11]

It’s been a minute.

2015–2018
- Exited FreeCharge. Spent time learning and investing.
- Pondered about: Why can't trust be rewarded? Started with $1M of personal capital.
- Launched CRED to reward people for paying credit card bills on time.

2019–2025
- Built a system run by a team that values ownership, judgment, and craft.
- Grew from 0 to 17M members by aligning incentives with behaviour.
- Built several products during COVID lockdowns.
- Raised $900M+ from global investors. Did 4 ESOP buybacks.
- Made Indiranagar and IPL ads slightly more interesting.
- Received a full stack of regulatory licences.
- Lost 35 kilos.
- Scaled from 0 to ~$325M ( ~₹3,200 crore) in annual revenue across payments, lending, insurance, commerce, wealth, and credit cards.
2026
- First profitable quarter (yet occasionally asked what our business model is)
- Raised another $900M from Meta in primary and secondary capital.
- Announcing our 5th ESOP buyback.

Today

CRED is ready for its next phase. I am stepping back and @miten steps in as interim CEO, partnered with an incredibly talented team. He has been heading strategy and finance and suffering me since 2020. I’m stepping away from the operating role and will continue as a shareholder. My commitment doesn’t change. Just the role.

Extremely grateful to our members, partners, regulators, and investors who made this possible. And to our board, Shailendra, Micky, Saurabh for their extraordinary conviction.

Team CRED, I’ll still expect you to be a 10x version of yourselves.

As for me, I’ll be joining Meta to lead WhatsApp globally.

Meta comes in as a minority investor in CRED. No access to member data.

While it’s come very far, the delta between WhatsApp today and its full potential is massive. I look forward to working with Mark, Chris, and the leadership across Meta for the next step in WhatsApp’s journey. Will, thank you for scaling something the world relies on quietly, and for making this transition smooth.

Onwards.

[Rajeev Mantri @RMantri]

Never been a better time to Build In India and @makeinindia!

Welcome! 🇮🇳

🚀🛰️🔬🧪🧬⚡️⚙️🛜🏭🦾

[Archie Sengupta @archiexzzz]

shyamal has left openai and is in blr right now, aiming for one of the hardest and most ambitious problems in science and research.

if you’re an ai researcher who wants to work on insanely hard problems, you should definitely reach out to shyamal.

life gives you a moonshot opportunity once. this is the one. act fast.

[shyamal @shyamalanadkat]

after close to four years at @openai, i moved from the bay area to india earlier this year. i still believe deeply in ensuring true superintelligence accelerates science and remains accessible and beneficial to all. having grown up here, i've also always felt deeply connected to the ecosystem here.

over the past several weeks, i've been speaking with researchers, engineers, and thinkers across india and apac. it's become clear that there are many who want to build the future from here. moving back felt like the counterintuitive choice. i no longer think that's true.

what's been missing is the belief that you can build institutions of global consequence from anywhere. and more importantly, the ambition and the will to pursue ideas that seem impossibly large at first. this may be a once in a generation opportunity.

more to come soon. DMs open if this resonates.

[Gabbar @GabbbarSingh]

https://t.co/GksxRLggvV