Nikhil Kolar

This was an awesome chat with Deepak Chhugani where we did a deep dive into how Nuvocargo is leveraging AI. We also discussed lots of topics like how B2B marketplaces often start off looking more like brokerages, how operationally complex marketplaces can leverage AI, taking the "full-stack AI" vs. vertical agent approach, early GTM strategies for B2B marketplaces, and more. This is a must-watch (or listen) for B2B marketplace founders and get ready to take some notes!

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The GCC Shift No One Is Talking About: “Decision Altitude Design” After returning to Hyderabad and meeting leaders across the GCC ecosystem, I’ve noticed something that rarely gets discussed, yet quietly determines whether a GCC becomes a strategic engine or stays a delivery shop. It’s not AI maturity. Not talent density. Not cost structure. It’s something bigger: The altitude at which decisions get made inside the GCC. Every GCC operates at one of three decision altitudes: Level 1-> Task Altitude Teams execute. They wait for clarity. They follow instructions. Great for output. Terrible for influence. Level 2 --> Ownership Altitude Teams manage outcomes. They shape how something is built. They add velocity and solve problems locally. Good for innovation. But still dependent on HQ for direction. Level 3 --> Enterprise Altitude (The Rare One) Teams think like the mothership. They understand the customer, the business model, the risk, the trade-offs. They influence what gets built, not just how. This is where a GCC becomes a global strategy center. Very few centers operate here , but the ones that do are redefining what “India-led leadership” means. Here’s the truth: You can hire hundreds of brilliant engineers. You can run 24×7 pods. You can automate everything in sight. But if your decision altitude stays low, your impact will stay low. The next wave of GCC transformation will come from redesigning - how context flows - how decisions are distributed - how India teams influence upstream thinking This is the real unlock. Now that I’m back in Hyderabad, this is the work that excites me the most: Building GCCs that operate at enterprise altitude, not just delivery altitude. If you're building a center here or scaling one, happy to connect, meet in person, and exchange notes. Hyderabad is ready for its next era of global leadership. And leaders who think at enterprise altitude will shape it. #GCC #Leadership #Hyderabad #IndiaGCC #DecisionDesign #DigitalTransformation #AI #FutureOfWork #ReturningLeader EY EY Technology Solutions Viswanathan K S GCC Pulse™ Susheel Kumar Achyut Menon "AK" Vishnu BG Amrish Kumar Shankaran (Shanks) Srinivasan Accenture in India Reshab Shaw LinkedIn News India T-Hub Vishwanadh Raju Supriya Sethi (She/Her/Hers) KPMG India Naveen Gullapalli Amgen India Lilly India McDonald's Global Office in India Vanguard India Covasant Pavan Kumar Bandaru Korn Ferry Kamal Karanth Xpheno Talentiser Michael Page PageGroup ANSR Subu Boyinapalli Lalit Ahuja Southwest Airlines StarRez, Inc. Happening Hyderabad Zinnov

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Launching: Chat with Priyank (beta) today on https://priyank.tech A few weeks ago, I launched priyank.tech as a single home for my work, projects, and notes. Today I’m adding a faster way to get to the signal: Skip the scrolling, ask.  “Chat with Priyank” answers questions about my projects, views, and skills by pulling the most relevant context and giving you a concise, useful response. What’s under the hood (and why): - Human‑verified access - Conversations start only after the system knows it’s interacting with a person, not a bot. - Scope & guardrails - It only answers questions about me. When a query is out of scope or uncertain, it responds with a polite “I don’t know.” - Context engineering first (no RAG, yet!) - An analysis by industry veterans suggested that GPT-5 class models can correctly use ~85% of the provided context. I want to see how far careful, prompt, and context design can go before adding retrieval. I’ll evaluate this over the next few days and decide before graduating from beta. - Prompt caching enabled - To keep costs under control (and responses snappy), repeat prompts and shared context are cached. - Early memory layer - A lightweight short-term memory layer powers more personal, consistent answers across sessions. Try it on: https://priyank.tech   If it’s your first visit, do subscribe to my newsletter—I’ll share build notes, decisions, and lessons learned there. Starter prompts: “Tell me about your AI and Generative AI expertise “How can you help me become an AI first organization?” Feedback is welcome, especially edge cases and failure modes.  #AI #product #buildinpublic #LLM

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If you're venturing into the world of D2C brands in India and seeking guidance on product development, marketing strategies, and navigating online marketplaces, this podcast featuring Sushank Arora is a valuable resource for your journey. Sushank shares insightful tips on harnessing consumer behavior to boost sales, offering a roadmap to establish a robust D2C brand. Tune in to gain actionable insights for your brand's success. #D2C #BrandBuilding #ConsumerBehavior #SalesBoost

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What is AIGuru? An experiment with AI to test the Hypothesis if AI can help make Indic Wisdom more accessible? So to get started 1) I searched up "The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda" 2) Downloaded the same - courtesy Ramakrishna Mission Pittsburgh 3) Uploaded it to Google NotebookLM 4) And within minutes generated a) A 7 minute Video + Audio podcast of the essence of Vedanta teachings of Swami ji - "The Lion Within" - https://lnkd.in/gVDdxMgK b) a mind map, a briefing doc, an FAQ doc, a study guide, and multiple vernacular audio podcasts in Hindi, Marathi, Punjabi, Telugu  etc. (Refer to the notebook linked in comments to explore all of the above) Some reflections and takeaways (Other than the essence of Vedanta of course) that this exercise reinforced for me 1) With AI the barrier to synthesize, remix and recreate content and experience - no matter how mainstream or how arcane - is now essentially Zero. 2) The limiting factor has always been and will always remain - human attention, human agency & human discretion. 3) So from a consumer point of view - While on the one end there is virtually no limit to what you can access - what you still need to have is the desire (the agency) and discretion (what to access, how to access) to benefit from all this abundance. And the difference in the degree of this desire & discretion will be the thing that will separate those who disproportionately benefit from AI compared to those who get left behind!  4) And from a Content producer's point of view: Well your Job was never harder that this - For your content to have ANY chance at all of standing out in this cornucopia - it would not only need to find your intended audience, entice them enough to engage with it, and hold them long enough to completely experience it, but also give them enough value to come back for more of it! In some sense it reinforces what customers have always really paid for in content - Aligned interests, Unique perspectives & Authentic Voices! Unless of course as a content creator you believe in - as Swami Ji summarises what Vedanta says about Unchained Action as the path to freedom from Maya - Work incessantly but give up all attachment to work - and want to create content - well not in return for some explicit reward or gratification, but because you chose to do so :) So would love to hear your thoughts on all three things - in any order a) the 4 takeaways and reflections above, and b) the quality of the synthesis generated by AI & the AI Guru experiment itself - Do follow the account if you would like to participate in this experiment c) the timeless wisdom of Vedanta, unchained action and "The Lion within" all of us! #AIGuru #IndicWisdombyAI #Vedanta #Philosophy #SelfRealisation #InnerStrength #Motivation #Spirituality #Leadership #PersonalGrowth #Fearlessness #Vivekananda #UnleashYourPotential #DivineWithin #TheLionWithin

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We're thrilled to announce we're partnering with Prince, Dr. Utkarsh and Dr. Gourav and leading the seed round for NPrep - an interactive learning platform which brings together personalized, level-based learning through AI, and over 1,400 hours of in-house video content - to teach close to a million nurses in India who undertake competitive exams every year for highly coveted roles here and around the world. India's is the world's largest supplier of healthcare workers, yet the shortage of trained nurses has kept growing as offline coaching centres, rote-learning and a lack of equipment isn't giving nurses the skills they need on the job. NPrep has already changed this for over 100,000 nurses who use the platform for gamified learning, detailed AI-led feedback for their doubts and a video curriculum designed by top AIIMS doctors and nurses. For anyone who has visited a loved one in hospital, you will know that nurses are the real lifeline - by the patient's bedside 24 hours a day. The level of their skill directly drives the outcome as much as the doctor. There is a structural shortage which needs to be filled to meet the world's healthcare needs, and who better than a team of three AIIMS trained doctors who have lived this problem together, to fix it. There has been a rush to solve global healthcare placements from India - the building blocks of that supply have to be built from the ground up through 1:1 learning which builds permanent skills, and a relationship which begins with students far before placement. The NPrep scale-up begins today. More on this here: https://lnkd.in/g9_46grT Lumikai Fund Salone Sehgal Abhay Malla Aditya Deshpande Aanchal Pant Anant Seth Tiasha Guha Neogy CA Rishabh Sethia Asher Siddiqui

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Ozlo has the energy of a team that never forgot what it felt like to build something people actually needed. The founders walked out of Bose carrying 23 yrs of engineering muscle memory, but also the sting of watching the original #Sleepbuds vanish before their prime. Co-Founder & CEO N.B. Patil knew the idea still had teeth, so he pulled in Co-Founder & CPO Charles Taylor and operator-turned-advisor Brian Mulcahey to rebuild the product from the inside out. Same comfort profile, new architecture. Same purpose, sharper execution. By 2024, Ozlo was shipping to 40+ countries, Time Inc. called the Sleepbuds one of the #BestInventions of 2025. The partnership with Calm is the moment where all that momentum stops being background noise. At 12:01 AM EST on Nov 13, the companies released the Ozlo x Calm Sleepbuds, a co-branded drop in a Calm Blue finish with a charging case etched with Take a Deep Breath. It is the hardware equivalent of a deep cut remix: Ozlo brings noise-masking audio, #biometric detection, #allnight comfort, and a sensor-rich case. Calm brings a library of 300+ hrs of sleep stories, #meditations, and #soundscapes, wrapped into a 1-yr subscription to Calm Sleep on iOS or Calm Premium on Android. The price holds at $349, but the value steps up when the subscription cuts the real cost by roughly 20%. The product stops living as a gadget and starts behaving like a nightly system. Calm gets reach into the physical world without touching a factory line. Led by CEO David Ko and guided creatively by Chief Content Officer Greg Justice, the company finds a path beyond app-only engagement, locking in a place on the nightstand instead of competing for home-screen real estate. Ozlo gets access to an audience that has crossed 150M downloads and gains a partner known for shaping behavior, not just delivering content. Eight days before the announcement, Ozlo expanded its Medical Advisory Board with Dr. Rebecca Robbins, PhD MS and Dr. Michael Gervais, a move that frames the Calm partnership as part of a wider push toward clinical credibility and future FDA applications, including tinnitus therapy already in motion. The sleep tech market is moving fast, growing at ~15–18% CAGR, and the companies able to unite purpose-built hardware with ecosystems that travel across #health, wellness, and #behavior are the ones setting the tempo. Ozlo and Calm aren't chasing hype; they're stitching together a category that's shifting from lifestyle to necessity. #Startups #StartupNews #Partnership #Sleep #SleepTech #Wellness #WellbeingTech #Healthcare #HealthTech #Technology #Innovation #TechEcosystem #StartupEcosystem #TechNews

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From Hadapsar to the world, powered by grit, not gimmicks A few days ago, I met Dr Vikram Rajguru. Not at a tech conference or a leadership offsite, but during a PRP treatment for my knee. But the real takeaway came from our conversation. Dr Vikram runs a small, independent clinic. Yet his mindset is anything but small. Like many small business owners, he wears multiple hats. But what sets him apart is how quietly he’s blending AI into the rhythm of his practice: → CRM tools to re-engage patients. → Chatbots that answer questions before anxiety sets in. → AI-generated education material that simplifies medical jargon. His clinic is now attracting patients not just from across India, but from the US, Europe, and Asia. The reviews? Glowing. Not because of flashy ads, but because of how deeply they care about patient wellbeing. What stood out wasn’t a dashboard, or VC funding, or an ad campaign; it was grit. The willingness to test, tweak, and keep going. In a healthcare space obsessed with scale and revenue, he’s focused on relevance, trust, and care. All of it built on a lean budget, in a market where attention is scarce, and switching costs are low. He’s not chasing “transformation”. He’s building it; patiently, and with the kind of resilience that doesn’t make headlines… but creates impact. It reminded me that innovation isn’t about having all the tools. It’s about using what you have, well. If a clinic in Pune can scale through purpose and persistence, so can any of us willing to do the work. 👟 Who’s the most quietly innovative business owner you know? #AIforSMBs #Resilience #HealthcareLeadership #IndiaInnovation #LeadershipInAction #GrowthWithCare

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here's another insight into our way of thinking in Kovant, an article that has been posted by my talented cofounders, that illustrates that agents are not just tools. There is a need for a paradigm shift to understand how they fit into our modern workforce.

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"If AI can now write performance reviews, analyze engagement data, and even predict attrition - what's left for leaders to actually lead?" The answer isn't in the tools. It's in the judgement calls no algorithm can make. At the CLO Summit in Mumbai recently, I joined Kumaar Bagrodia, Krishnan Narayanan and Lt Col Sanjeev Malik to discuss this question. The conversation reinforced something I've been observing: while organisations rush to adopt AI tools, they're struggling with basic questions about when to use them and when not to. The technology is available. The judgement framework for deploying it isn't. Leaders need three capabilities today: understanding what technology can do, maintaining human-centricity despite pressure for speed and scale, and anchoring decisions in org. purpose rather than just performance metrics. The paradox is real. The same companies automating operations are simultaneously investing in "high-touch" customer experiences. The same leaders celebrating AI efficiency are quietly worried about org. culture. Technology should support human goals, not determine them. That distinction will separate effective organizations from efficient ones. How do you decide when human judgement should override algorithmic efficiency? #leadership #futureofwork #ai #beyondtheplaybook

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On the latest episode of Embracing Erosion I sat down with Suyog Deshpande, Co-Founder & CEO of Webless (a Fluvio Ventures portfolio company). Before starting Webless, Suyog spent years at Amplitude, Salesforce, and Samsara - shaping products and GTM strategy at scale as a product marketing leader. That perspective is now fueling one of the boldest bets in tech: 🏗️ rebuilding the web for LLMs. Instead of optimizing for clicks and SEO, Webless imagines an agentic web -where sites are designed to interact directly with AI models and agents. We dug into: - What an LLM-native web could actually look like - How companies can prepare to be LLM-ready - What metrics will matter beyond pageviews and clicks - Why safety and trust are core to agent-driven experiences - Lessons Suyog brings from “big tech” into this transformation If you’re curious about how discovery, trust, and value exchange will evolve online, this one’s worth your time. Link to the full episode in the comments 👇

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Accidents are tragic events, but can one learn from them and design driving systems and software that could safely and robustly avoid such events in the future? This blog attempts to answer this question and also starts to define a methodology to extract information from such accidents for simulation-based V&V of the driving software.

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Excited to share that Jayashree Rajan is coming on board as our GTM Advisor at Interact AI. This one feels special. Jayashree was one of our earliest customers. The sharp kind. The kind who pulls apart your narrative, questions your category, and asks "where do you actually win?" Her review calls slowly became internal strategy sessions. Positioning debates. ICP sharpening. Enterprise buying psychology. Category framing. We’d walk in to give updates. We’d walk out thinking differently. Jayashree brings deep CMO experience building positioning from scratch, shaping category stories, and translating market shifts into real revenue outcomes. Grateful for the early conviction. Even more excited for what we’re building next.

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🧭 If one of the reasons for the leadership change was “missing AI opportunities,” that would be disappointing. Venture has always been about taking calculated risks, not chasing every trend. Even the best firms will pass on some winners; the real test is whether they stay disciplined enough to find the ones that fit their conviction. Sequoia’s strength has always been long-term focus and pattern recognition through cycles. The danger is not missing a single AI deal, it is losing the ability to think independently amid the noise. https://lnkd.in/eVKiCEtD #VentureCapital #Leadership #AI #Governance #Startups #SequoiaCapital

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2026 is going to be the defining year for InMobi and Glance! The investments in AI native tech stack that we made over decades is now starting to show brilliant results. The AI led hyper-growth we are seeing in our core product and business across InMobi and Glance is jaw dropping. Mansi Jain Rajat Wanchoo Naveen Tewari Aimee Zmugg Kelli Lin Aashish Benjamin Oommen Abhinav Mohan Rakesh Ranjan

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Nearly 2 years ago, Ashutosh, Varun, and I crowded around a whiteboard debating if AI could understand the nuances behind human conversations. Why does a VP of Sales answer “How’s the quarter going?” one way to the CEO and another to a board member? The context changes the response. That was the spark behind Viven, which we invested in this year. Most AI can pull up data. But what about the relationships, unspoken cues, and history that shape decisions? So much gets lost when people move on from orgs or when stories never make it into docs. Viven calls their approach “pairwise context" - training AI to recognize who’s speaking + listening, and how their relationship shapes the conversation. Those endless debates evolved into a mission to help orgs preserve their most valuable knowledge... the experience and insight that lives in people’s heads and is rarely written down. It’s an ambitious vision, but one that will transform how orgs learn. Work that once moved at the speed of meetings could eventually move at the speed of thought. I shared more about how we’re making this possible, and why I believe in Viven, here → https://lnkd.in/g8C3PkK5

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"𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐥𝐝 𝐢𝐬 𝐠𝐞𝐭𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐨𝐭𝐢𝐜. 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐨𝐧𝐥𝐲 𝐰𝐚𝐲 𝐭𝐨 𝐤𝐞𝐞𝐩 𝐮𝐩 𝐢𝐬 𝐛𝐲 𝐦𝐨𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐟𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐝𝐞𝐞𝐩𝐞𝐫." That’s one of the many takeaways from our first session of 𝐀𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐥 𝐁𝐨𝐥𝐝 𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 (𝐀𝐁𝐂)—a new initiative where we bring candid, thought-provoking voices into the room. Kunal Shah kicked off the series with sharp insights and unfiltered honesty. He spoke about trust as a currency, human behavior in uncertain times, and why Indian brands face a unique challenge: building trust in a deeply skeptical environment. His line “𝐓𝐫𝐮𝐬𝐭 𝐢𝐬 𝐚 𝐬𝐥𝐨𝐰 𝐜𝐮𝐫𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐲” stuck with many of us. It is an uphill battle Indian brands face every day, gaining consumer trust and keeping up with it. We also explored how rising chaos is shaping investor psychology. As Kunal put it, people are now swinging between extremes, going either ultra-conservative or hyper-risky. This shift is already influencing how money decisions are being made. This was not just a FinTech or business conversation. It was about staying human, relevant, and intentional in a world that’s constantly changing. Thank you, Kunal Shah, for setting the bar high and for making us think beyond the obvious. At Angel One, we grow by staying curious and thinking deeper Angel Bold Conversations (ABC) is just one way we are learning from the best and challenging the way we think. CRED #AngelOne #AngelBoldConversations #LeadershipInsights

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Just concluded a mandate to help define and operationalize the AI Product Strategy for CX, for an early stage tech co. Key learnings for an org which is extremely dynamic in nature and operating in a highly-regulated vertical - 1. Build for today but actively anticipate for future scenarios 2. Stress on the human-in-the-loop (HITL), esp due to the regulations involved 3. Combine CX with account management/ upselling, when the HITL kicks-in 4. Redefine how metrics look in an AI-first world Deployments like these have the added benefit of forcing companies to chart their customer journey and bring the focus back to the user.

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A moment of quiet pride seeing this feature on Aparna Acharekar and the journey of coto . What began as listening to real conversations — about abandonment, misunderstandings, workplace stress, and relationship struggles — has grown into something much larger: a space where people can seek support in the moments they need it most. At its heart, coto was never meant to be just another platform. It was built on a simple belief: emotional support should be accessible, immediate, and safe. Today, millions of conversations later, the goal remains the same — not to make people dependent, but to help them rediscover their own strength and joy. Grateful to Aparna Acharekar for shaping this vision - alongside our super committed team of hundreds of experts, onboarding specialist, marketers and engineers and to everyone who continues to believe that emotional wellbeing deserves the same urgency as physical health. The journey continues.

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