At 16, Pranjali Awasthi built a Rs 100-cr AI firm, now she's making 'ChatGPT with hands'

At just 16 years old, Pranjali Awasthi—an Indian-origin tech prodigy—shocked the startup world by building Delv.AI, an AI-powered platform that revolutionized the way researchers interact with data. Fast-forward just two years, and now at age 18, she's on an even bolder mission: creating what she calls "ChatGPT with hands"—an intelligent agent that doesn’t just answer questions, but takes real-world actions.

The Spark of Genius

Born in India and raised by a family deeply rooted in technology, Pranjali’s journey started at the age of 7, when her father—himself a computer engineer—introduced her to the world of programming. While most kids were playing games, Pranjali was learning how to build them.

At 11, her family moved to Florida, USA, giving her access to competitive STEM programs, coding bootcamps, and math olympiads. By 13, she was already interning at Florida International University’s Neural Dynamics Lab, working on real-world machine learning and neuroscience projects, including EEG-based ADHD detection—something many students wouldn't encounter even in graduate school.

Birth of Delv.AI – A ?100 Crore Dream

In January 2022, at just 15 going on 16, Pranjali launched Delv.AI, a platform focused on extracting and summarizing data from large academic and research documents using artificial intelligence. The idea came from her own frustrations while working in research—sifting through massive PDFs and trying to find relevant insights manually.

Her platform allowed users to:

• Upload academic PDFs

• Run context-aware searches across multiple documents

• Summarize findings into structured CSVs

• Save up to 75% of research time

This idea gained traction almost immediately in academic and corporate R&D circles. In less than a year, Delv.AI secured USD $450,000 (?3.7 crore) in funding from top Silicon Valley backers like On Deck, Village Global, Backend Capital, and AngelList Quant Fund.

By late 2023, Delv.AI had achieved a staggering ?100 crore valuation, something unheard of for a company run by a teenager.

Dash: Not Just Talk, But Action

Now in 2025, while studying Computer Science at Georgia Tech, Pranjali is taking AI one step further with her new innovation: Dash.

"If ChatGPT can talk, Dash can talk and act."

Dash isn’t just another chatbot. It’s an intelligent agent—a digital assistant that understands context, processes data, and takes actions like scheduling, filing documents, summarizing emails, or even operating software tools on your behalf.

Unlike traditional chatbots which are reactive and limited to dialogue, Dash is proactive and autonomous—capable of following up, setting tasks, or integrating into workflows.

It recently made waves on Product Hunt, where it quickly shot to the top spot, praised for its “human-like execution power” and real-world utility. A community on Discord now follows its development, and early testers are already using Dash in customer support, education, and research workflows.

Life Between Books and Business

What’s perhaps most impressive is how Pranjali balances education and enterprise. Though she postponed formal university entrance initially to focus on Delv.AI, she always emphasized that:

"Learning never stops—whether it’s inside a university or outside it."

Now enrolled in Georgia Tech, she continues to learn, lead, and innovate simultaneously—proving that being young is not a limitation, but often a superpower when paired with vision and discipline.

What Makes Her Different?

• Early mentorship: Her father’s consistent guidance helped her not only learn coding but develop a builder’s mindset.

• Hands-on research: Instead of only reading about AI, she worked in real-world labs from age 13.

• Startup execution: Unlike many ideas that stay on paper, she built, launched, and scaled Delv.AI with just a 10-member team.

• Investor trust: Securing funding at such a young age showcases her clarity of thought and power of communication.

What the Future Holds

With Dash, Pranjali envisions a world where AI doesn't just help you write emails or summarize texts—but one where your AI can:

• Order your groceries

• Schedule and reschedule meetings

• Extract actionable insights from hours of videos or documents

• Interface with apps like Notion, Google Docs, or Slack to perform work for you

She calls it the transition from “AI that speaks” to “AI that works”.

 A Role Model for Young Coders

For young students, especially girls interested in tech, Pranjali’s journey is a powerful message:

"You don’t need to wait till you're 25 with a PhD to build something impactful. All you need is a laptop, curiosity, and courage."

She’s already mentoring other young innovators and plans to launch a foundation that provides coding education in rural India by the end of 2025.

Final Words

From a 7-year-old coder in India to an 18-year-old global tech entrepreneur, Pranjali Awasthi's journey is nothing short of cinematic. With Delv.AI, she simplified how humans interact with research. With Dash, she’s about to redefine how humans interact with actionable intelligence.

She is not just creating tools—she is creating a future where AI becomes a true assistant, not just a digital parrot.

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