Pujun Bhatnagar dropped out of Stanford, Harved, and MIT to build startups. He decided to build in an unsexy industry and it worked. He doubled Kintsugi’s valuation to $75M in 3 months.
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In this conversation we discuss:
Kintsugi
- (00:00) — Intro
- (00:57) — What Kintsugi does & why it's successful
- (14:22) — What Kintsugi means
Founder Mode
- (03:15) — Why Pujun did an "unsexy" business
- (09:40) — AM frequency vs. Pujun's FM frequency
- (12:29) — What happens to ambition when success comes
- (26:20) — Pujun's mindset shifts over time
- (32:20) — Pujun's toughest situation with co-founders
- (59:10) — Dropping out of academia 3x
- (1:07:20) — What Pujun does when not performing at his best
- (1:10:00) — Pujun's spices
AI & Technology
- (05:36) — What problems AI can solve
- (19:44) — Successfully building AI PLG
- (21:44) — The future of AI models
- (51:14) — Differences between the ML & LLM gold rush
- (54:46) — How to identify AI snake oil
Growth & Strategy
- (17:06) — Focusing on building good software
- (24:31) — Tradeoffs that come with scale
- (34:51) — Having conviction & discipline
- (36:11) — Who Pujun & Kintsugi looks for in teammates
- (38:09) — Doubling valuation in 3 months time
- (42:04) — Optimizing for minimal dilution
- (43:53) — Ruthless prioritization when scaling
Rapid Fire
- (1:12:09) — Who is one investor you’d recommend?
- (1:13:33) — One thing you'd change about startups?
- (1:16:22) — Advice for first-time founders?
- (1:16:55) — Something you believe that most disagree with?
