How Pujun Bhatnagar Doubled His Startup’s Valuation to $75M… in 3 Months

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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🐦 X → x.com/pujun_ai
💼 LinkedIn → linkedin.com/in/pujun
🚀 Startup → trykintsugi.com

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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?