# Ajith

Ajith (Co-founder, Cactus (Y Combinator batch); previously co-founder of Turing Labs) was a guest on AI with Sach, a podcast hosted by Sacha Gucciardo in Montréal.

## Episode 29: Building Cactus: AI That Actually Helps Solopreneurs (June 2025)

Cactus co-founders explain how a personal need for private chefs led them to build an AI assistant for solopreneurs, and why they build slowly.

Page: https://aiwithsach.com/episodes/29-building-cactus-ai-that-actually-helps-solopreneur/

> And me and Avnash were meeting with the chef. We asked her, like, how much did you earn last month? And she was like, she gave us a number. And we said, okay, can we just take a look at actually your transactions? And it was half of that, technically. So she was shocked.
> — at 14:24 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PY8qVlbYHjU&t=864s)

> You cannot replicate that energy through software. You cannot replicate that energy through a technology, right? And that's the 10% which we don't want to automate. Because that is the soul of your company. And it's usually the founder, right?
> — at 35:12 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PY8qVlbYHjU&t=2112s)

> So what really keeps me up at night is will AI really change our lives to an extent where human relationships won't matter at all? Right? That's very scary to me. For example, can everybody have like an AI boyfriend, girlfriend? And can they live in this virtual AI life where you'd never have to talk to anybody?
> — at 48:20 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PY8qVlbYHjU&t=2900s)

> And we believe SMB, small, medium businesses and solopreneurs are going to be the future. There's going to be millions of them. And the entire market is going to change. And we believe that the first billionaire solopreneur will be built on Cactus, right?
> — at 8:28 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PY8qVlbYHjU&t=508s)

> We didn't really spend much time understanding each other. Honestly, we didn't even meet when we became co-founders, actually. So it is a big mistake. Right. And it became very clear to me that over a period of years that the alignment was the base foundation was not there, basically.
> — at 20:19 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PY8qVlbYHjU&t=1219s)

> But we clearly know who's accountable for what that, okay, if selling is not happening, then it's me. If product is not working, it's Avinash. Like that's, it's as simple as that.
> — at 22:44 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PY8qVlbYHjU&t=1364s)

> So if you look at the graph of how important experience is versus how important the rate of learning is, right? So in 1990s, the experience mattered a lot, right? Your rate of learning was not that important. And I think in the 2010-15, it was like kind of equalized. But I think we are now really truly finally in the place where I think experience matters way less than how quickly you can learn.
> — at 26:17 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PY8qVlbYHjU&t=1577s)

> First is they get a lot of inquiries every week and only 10 or 15% of them are actually going to be paying customers. So they waste a lot of time talking to all of them. And the second is that when somebody inquires, you have to get back to them within five minutes. If you don't, they are lost.
> — at 30:50 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PY8qVlbYHjU&t=1850s)

> You're running a business, right? It's much easier to hire an assistant who will do everything for you versus cloning yourself. Right? So we want to be on the assistant side versus the trying to clone, basically.
> — at 37:38 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PY8qVlbYHjU&t=2258s)