# Vatsal Bhardwaj

> Vatsal Bhardwaj is the founder and CEO of Jabali.ai, a Los Altos startup building a no-code, generative-AI game engine that lets anyone create and publish video games from text prompts. A 20-year product and engineering executive, he helped build the Oculus App Store at Meta (which generated $1.5B+ in cumulative revenue), led AWS Game Tech, ran Studios at Storm8, and served as Chief Product Officer at Skillz. In 2024 Jabali raised a $5M seed round led by BITKRAFT Ventures with Sapphire Ventures and Sony Innovation Fund.

- **Role:** Founder and CEO at Jabali.ai
- **Organizations:** Jabali.ai, Skillz, Amazon Web Services, Meta (Oculus), Storm8, Zynga, Microsoft
- **Nationality:** Indian-American
- **Education:** MBA, Entrepreneurship and Innovation (President, MIT Innovation Club), MIT Sloan School of Management, MS, Electrical Engineering (Hidden Markov Models, Multivariate State Estimation), Duke University, BE, Computer Engineering (Artificial Neural Networks for Character Recognition), Gujarat University
- **Known for:** Helped create the Oculus App Store at Meta, generating $1.5B+ in cumulative revenue, Led and grew AWS Game Tech, building cloud services for game and simulation developers, Led Studios at Storm8 (200+ people), launching 20+ games with 1B+ downloads before a $400M sale

## Career timeline

- **2004** — At Microsoft, engineered the first Bluetooth software for the Windows OS; nominated to the Bluetooth SIG board.
- **2010s** — At Zynga, drove corporate strategy positioning the company for mobile, international expansion, and its IPO.
- **2010s** — At Storm8, led Studios as Head/GM of a 200+ person team; launched 20+ games reaching 1B+ downloads and $150M+ revenue; company sold for $400M.
- **2010s** — At Meta/Oculus, led product in VR and helped create the Oculus App Store, generating $1.5B+ in cumulative revenue.
- **2020s** — At AWS, served as General Manager of Games Technology and Simulations; founded game publishing services and launched the Open 3D initiative with the Linux Foundation.
- **2020s** — Served as Chief Product Officer at Skillz, leading 250+ person product and tech teams.
- **2023** — Co-founded Jabali (with Arnav Jhala) in Los Altos, California.
- **2024** — Jabali raised a $5M seed round led by BITKRAFT Ventures with Sapphire Ventures and Sony Innovation Fund.
- **2025** — Released the Jabali MVP/Studio publicly; AI game development platform supporting 2D and 3D, with Vibe Code and Design Mode.

## Achievements

- Helped create the Oculus App Store at Meta, generating $1.5B+ in cumulative revenue
- Led and grew AWS Game Tech, building cloud services for game and simulation developers
- Led Studios at Storm8 (200+ people), launching 20+ games with 1B+ downloads before a $400M sale
- Engineered the first Bluetooth software in the Windows OS (2004); nominated to the Bluetooth SIG board
- Chief Product Officer at public company Skillz, leading 250+ person teams
- Reported career totals: ~$3B cumulative revenue, 1B+ customers reached, 32 games and consumer products, 6 cloud services launched
- Raised $5M seed for Jabali from Bitkraft, Sapphire Ventures, and Sony Innovation Fund

## Latest updates

- **2024-03** — Jabali announced a $5M seed round led by BITKRAFT Ventures with Sapphire Ventures and Sony Innovation Fund.
- **2025-05** — Released the Jabali MVP to the public.
- **2025-10** — Unveiled Jabali Studio - an AI game development platform with Vibe Code and Design Mode, supporting 2D/3D and integrating Gemini, Claude, OpenAI, and Grok.

## Links

- Website: https://www.vatsalbhardwaj.com/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vatsal
- Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/vatsal
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGr4Gz0Zbdg
- Facebook: https://facebook.com/vatsal

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/vatsal-bhardwaj
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-06-21