Freshworks is a cloud-based business software company that builds easy-to-use customer service, IT service management and CRM tools for companies that found legacy enterprise software too complicated and too expensive. Founded in Chennai in 2010 as Freshdesk, it became the first India-born SaaS company to list on Nasdaq in 2021 and now serves tens of thousands of customers worldwide with an AI assistant, Freddy, woven through its products.
ChangeEngine is a San Francisco-based AI-powered employee experience platform that helps People teams design, automate and personalize internal communications across the entire employee lifecycle - from onboarding to recognition - across email, Slack, Teams, SMS and SharePoint, without forcing employees to log in to a new tool.
Humand is a mobile-first, all-in-one HR platform built for the 2.7 billion deskless and frontline workers who have never had a proper digital work home. Founded in 2020 by Nicolas Benenzon and Geronimo Maspero, the platform combines 30+ HR modules - from internal communications and payroll to performance reviews and AI-powered automation - into a single app. With 1.6 million workers across 1,500+ organizations in 51 countries, and a $66M Series A raised in February 2026 co-led by Kaszek and Goodwater Capital, Humand is positioning itself as the operating system for the world's largest workforce segment.
Anand Prajapati is Co-Founder and CTO of Leena AI, an enterprise agentic AI platform that deploys AI colleagues to automate back-office work across HR, IT, Finance, and Procurement. A graduate of IIT Delhi, Anand built Leena AI's technology from scratch after two earlier startup pivots, guiding the company through Y Combinator's Summer 2018 batch to a $30M Series B led by Bessemer Venture Partners. Today Leena AI's platform serves 400+ enterprise customers across 90+ countries - including Nestlé, Coca-Cola, and Sony - resolving millions of employee queries autonomously across 100+ languages.
Andrew Higashi is the Co-founder and CEO of ChangeEngine, a San Francisco-based AI-powered employee experience platform that helps companies communicate with and engage their people the way the best brands engage customers. A three-time company builder, he spent a decade honing enterprise sales and go-to-market strategy at Gigya, WorkSpan, and Sendoso before founding ChangeEngine in 2021 with the same co-founding team he has worked alongside for ten years. ChangeEngine has raised $15.5 million in total funding, including a $10 million Series A led by Threshold Ventures in 2024, and serves 310+ employees globally with operations in the US, UK, and Latin America.
Dhiraj Sharma is the Founder and CEO of Simpplr, the AI-powered employee experience platform that has raised $139M across four funding rounds, including a $70M Series D in 2023. A serial entrepreneur with over 20 years of experience, he previously founded Simplion Technologies and Lirik Inc. before co-founding Simpplr in 2014. Under his leadership, Simpplr has been recognized as a Leader in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Intranet Packaged Solutions, the Forrester Wave for Intranet Platforms, and the IDC MarketScape for Integrated Employee Workspaces, building a platform designed to make work more human for hundreds of enterprise clients.
Kaushik Arakalgud is a technology entrepreneur and builder based in Bengaluru, India, currently working in AI at Domestika - the global creative learning platform that reached unicorn status with a $1.3B valuation in 2022. As Co-Founder and CTO of Aimwiser, an AI and neuroscience-powered people and wellness intelligence SaaS platform, he brings together his passion for education technology, artificial intelligence, and human development. Trained as a computer science engineer at PES College of Engineering, Kaushik has spent his career at the intersection of technology and meaningful societal impact.
Piyush Rajput is the Co-Founder and SVP of Engineering at Simpplr, the AI-powered employee experience platform he helped build from the ground up in 2014. A civil engineering graduate from IIT Delhi, he pivoted to software and has spent 15+ years at the intersection of engineering and product - now overseeing the technology behind a platform serving 2 million+ employees at companies like Moderna, Penske, and the NHS. Simpplr has raised $139M+ in total funding and reached a Series D under his technical leadership.
Simpplr is an AI-powered employee experience platform - the modern intranet for the chat-overloaded enterprise. Founded in 2014 and headquartered in Redwood City, California, it consolidates internal communications, engagement, recognition, and knowledge into a single personalized hub used by 1,000+ companies and over 2 million employees worldwide.