Aakrit Vaish

Aakrit Vaish is the Co-Founder & CEO of Haptik, one of the world’s largest conversational AI companies. Aakrit started the company in 2013 and lead it to a successful strategic investment with Reliance Industries in 2019 in a $100 million transaction. Haptik today processes close to 100 million users annually, has presence across 7 global locations, and counts Oyo Rooms, KFC, Samsung, Coca-Cola amongst its marquee clients. Aakrit invests in startups in the areas of Consumer Internet, SaaS and Direct to Consumer brands. He has been a part of the Forbes 30 Under 30, Entrepreneur 35 Under 35 and Business World 40 Under 40 Lists. Aakrit started his career in San Francisco as the 12th employee at a mobile analytics startup Flurry (exited to Yahoo! in a $280 million deal), after having finished his B.S. in Engineering at the University of Illinois, Urbana Champaign. Aakrit started Flurry's India office and ran its global business operations, besides handling a number of other roles. In 2013, he co-founded and was the lead investor in Flat.to (Flatchat), a rental flatmate- finding application, which was later acquired by Commonfloor.

Besides spearheading the overall business operations of the company, Aakrit also oversees key aspects such as revenue & finance, hiring, and defining the strategy and vision of the company. Driven by the belief that “an idea can take you to a great product, but people can help you build a great company", he devotes almost half his time to recruiting the right talent for Haptik. With a robust belief in the potential of chatbots as interface, Aakrit has his eyes set on the mission of establishing Haptik as the world’s largest chatbot company in the next 5 years. Having invested in 10 start-ups, Aakrit spends a lot of his time in helping them out with strategy and guidance in the areas of mobile internet and SaaS. When he does take time off, he loves to travel or catch a game of football, especially if his favorite club, Manchester United, is playing.