IITian CEO walked away from a ₹4 crore job to launch AI startup that just raised $61 million

₹4 crore job to launch AI startup that just raised $61 million”> Published on: Nov 07, 2025 01:07 pm Varun Vummadi and Esha Manideep, both IIT alums, launched their AI startup Giga in 2023. Giga, an Artificial intelligence (AI) support automation startup founded two IIT Kharagpur alums, has raised $61 million in Series A funding led Redpoint Ventures. An old LinkedIn post one of the founders shows how both techies walked away from their high-paying job offers to build a startup that is now making headlines. Varun Vummadi, who co-founded Giga with his IIT classmate Esha Manideep. (LinkedIn) Varun Vummadi, in a two-year-old post, wrote about how he was offered a PhD from a renowned university and a high-paying job, but decided to leave it all to work on something of his own. “I received a PhD offer from Stanford University and a $525K job offer from an international HFT as a quant trader. We left all those opportunities to pursue our passion towards solving challenging problems in Machine learning.” He added that his co-founder, Esha Manideep, left a “$150K job as a system engineer role with a prominent Indian HFT firm.” The post, shared a day before Vummadi and Manideep launched Giga, was recently reshared on X, and it has created chatter. Social media had a lot to say:An individual posted, “Wow. Respect.” Another added, “They are indeed the biggest risk takers. I admire them so much; one day I want to do something like that.” A third expressed, “This is amazing.” A fourth wrote, “Kudos.” Varun Vummadi shared this LinkedIn post a day before launching Giga. (LinkedIn) Who are Varun Vummadi and Esha Manideep?Varun Vummadi and Esha Manideep were both featured on the Forbes “30 Under 30 Asia” l in 2024. While Esha Manideep serves as co-founder and CTO of Giga, Varun Vummadi is the CEO and co-founder of the AI company. Both graduated from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur. Announcing the $61 million funding, Varun Vummadi tweeted, “We have raised a $61M Series A to automate customer operations. The world’s leading companies like DoorDash trust Giga to supercharge customer experience with AI.” News / Trending / IITian CEO walked away from a ₹4 crore job to launch AI startup that just raised $61 million See Less