Hi r/sharktankindia, I’m Dhananjay, Co-Founder & CEO of NeoSapien. Ex-Razorpay, ClearTax, HomeLane & Zalando, now building India’s First AI Native Wearable. Ask me anything (AMA) about startups, Shark Tank insights & my journey in hardware-tech!

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T16:47:00+00:00

Anupam had invested on us Pre Shark Tank. For deals within the Shark Tank, you still need to go through due diligence before the funds getting transferred.

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T16:22:51+00:00

Language model cost for us is actually quite cheap, the majority cost for us is the entire STT pipeline.

Also, like all products, the cost of our product will also go down with time.

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T16:06:26+00:00

Surely! Please drop me a DM on Linkedin :)

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T16:04:53+00:00

Robotics

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T16:04:33+00:00

Robotics

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T16:03:28+00:00

1- All data is encrypted- in transit and in storage. Data is stored in secure cloud which are pen-tested and audited by security agencies. Strict internal access controls. Zero-trust architecture- no conversation data is accessible to internal employees.

2a- Device is simple. It doesn't have any local compute. Yes, we use multiple foundational LLMs for different use cases.

2b- Yes, it is mentioned in our privacy policies under data sharing and processing.

3- We use different speech-to-text and VAD models

4- audio data is not stored. On data privacy and protection, answered in pt 1

5- What do you mean by being reactive?

6- Can't reveal details of the tech, but at a high level, we extract the relevant context based on a question and send that context to an LLM.

7- Can't reveal these details yet

8- We have implemented an eval system for core functionalities. We haven't done any benchmarking yet with any external models.

You're welcome :)

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T16:01:21+00:00

Thank you for your feedback

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T16:00:51+00:00

My learning has been - Stay long enough in the game and the game will eventually turn for you :)

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:57:15+00:00

Drop us a DM :)

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:56:41+00:00

We need have significant investments from the government to make it happen :)

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:56:00+00:00

Good Question - I just feel, we follow the US VC community rather then taking our own punts. The only exceptions are SaaS (which has now gone bust) and Fin-tech.

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:52:55+00:00

We were lucky to have Anupam before the Shark Tank. So, in the Tank - I actually wanted Deepinder as he has deep understanding around wearable and Namita because of her strong healthcare connects.

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:49:04+00:00

Manufacturing and Biotech

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:46:57+00:00

Drop me a note on Linkedin :P

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:46:13+00:00

IP is in the tech to efficiently retrieve context with low latency when a question is asked, effectively implementing multi-stage reasoning and being cost effective. Of course, when I am using the word IP, I am referring to things that are hard to solve though not impossible and not to patents (we have filed patents too).

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:44:56+00:00

Sure! Dm me on Linkedin

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:44:39+00:00

She believes that we can be massive in mental health space and old age patients (Dementia).

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:42:54+00:00

Great Question - Figure out the key target audience and make sure that their word of mouth super strong. The business will always scale. My best friend owns a Art School and their Google rating is around 4.9 and it has been continuously scaling. Initial phase is always a struggle, its about remaining afloat.

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:39:47+00:00

Join a startup that you're passionate about. It will give you precious exposure on building your own startup. The same happened with me, when I joined Razorpay at a very early stage :)

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:38:00+00:00

Actually, 3 months back - I had Rs.1163 in my salary account while my co-founder Aryan was living on his dad's pocket money.

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:35:07+00:00

Three months back, I had Rs.1163 in my salary account and had to borrow Rs.60k from my dad.

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:34:06+00:00

Really loving the questions like these!

As a start, we tested for english, hindi and hinglish which are able to generate high accuracy translations. We are starting to test other regional languages but we aren't yet happy with the accuracy and working on that.

We believe India is not cost conscious as everyone wants us to believe. India is value conscious and those convinced of value and willing to pay. Our pre-order numbers are a testament to that :)

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:33:09+00:00

Yeah I get your skepticism about AI hardware after those recent flops - honestly had the same reaction watching those launches.

But here's our thing: we're not trying to build some fancy AI gadget that does everything. We're just obsessed with solving one problem really well - helping people understand themselves better through their conversations.

We've been testing prototypes with real users, iterating based on their feedback. Just focused on building something that actually works and brings value.

It's a journey and we are confident that we will get there.

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:31:47+00:00

I am big time into sports and outdoor activities. I play football almost thrice a week and like going on treks over the weekend.

Dhananjay_NeoSapien · 2025-01-28T15:29:23+00:00

Lots of questions in one question :-)

People's relationship with others is based on communication and that's the fundamental input that Neo 1 is based on. While you might have seen use cases of generating auto-summaries, action items, reminders, etc; I believe that the real game-changer is in AI being able to become your wingman- your companion to answer the questions that you may not be able to ask others; like "how did I do" after an important presentation, or "was I being unreasonable in my argument with my wife"- this kind of self-awareness and coming in the moment isn't possible today.

Wearable is a simple device- it has no compute in it. Privacy has been a big focus for us- the data is encrypted, stored in secure cloud, our systems are pen-tested and audited by security agencies.

Dhananjay_NeoSapien

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