Pawan Prabhat: The IIT/IIM Mind Scaling India's Generative AI Wave with Shorthills AI
In the rapidly evolving landscape of Artificial Intelligence, few Indian entrepreneurs possess the blend of deep technical understanding, business acumen, and proven execution capability demonstrated by Pawan Prabhat. As the Co-founder and President of Shorthills AI, he stands at the forefront of applying cutting-edge Generative AI and Large Language Models (LLMs) to solve complex enterprise problems. But his journey didn't start here. Pawan is a serial entrepreneur, having previously co-founded and scaled the EdTech giant EduPristine to a successful multi-million dollar exit.
What drives a technologist from IIT Bombay and IIM Indore to build not one, but two impactful ventures? What lessons were learned scaling a bootstrapped company globally? And what is the vision behind Shorthills AI's push into the complex world of enterprise AI?
I recently had the pleasure of hosting Pawan Prabhat, alongside his long-time co-founder Paramdeep Singh, on the Founder Thesis podcast. It was a deep dive into their incredible journey, the nuances of building AI, and their unique founder philosophy.
Check out the video of the conversation here or read on for insights.
🎓 From Engineering Roots to Business Leadership
Pawan Prabhat's foundation is built on rigorous technical training and sharp business insight.
IIT Bombay (1996-2001): Armed with a Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering, Pawan entered the world of technology during the dot-com era's formative years.
Early Tech Roles (2001-2007): He honed his skills as a software developer and consultant at companies like Geometric Software (working on CAD/CAM products), TCS, Wipro, and Crisil - S&P. As he mentioned on the podcast, before his MBA, he was a:
"...hardened. Ah. Java whatever program. But you know this is what we were doing."
IIM Indore (2003-2005): Seeking to bridge the gap between technology and business, Pawan pursued an MBA in Finance. It was here his path significantly intertwined with his future co-founder, Paramdeep Singh, a classmate with whom he'd later publish research papers.
Investment Banking (2007-2008): Post-MBA, Pawan stepped into the high-stakes world of investment banking at Standard Chartered Securities, leading IPOs. This experience proved pivotal.
"Day in day out, we were meeting ah founders of companies which were about to go public... and we thought you know maybe I mean if not today then when? you know mean when where should you do that because you're meeting people who had you know taken a bet at least ten years ago or twenty years ago..."
This exposure to successful entrepreneurs lit the spark for his own venture.
📈 EduPristine: Building an EdTech Behemoth (2008-2018)
In 2008, long before "EdTech" became a buzzword fueled by VC dollars, Pawan Prabhat, along with Paramdeep Singh and other co-founders, launched EduPristine. They saw a clear gap in the market.
The Opportunity: While India had institutions like NIIT for tech training, there was a lack of high-quality, practical education for finance professionals aiming for global certifications or industry-ready skills. Existing courses were often too theoretical.
"...my en analogy was always you know that there is an NI[IT] for tech guys... but there was nothing for finance guys... professional courses certifications for finance. So personally I thought there was a huge gap out there because there was nothing you know equivalent to an NI[IT]..."
The EduPristine Model:
Practical Focus: Started with professional certifications like FRM (Financial Risk Management) and CFA, later adding practical courses like Financial Modeling.
Blended Learning Pioneer: Offered classroom, live online, and asynchronous online courses right from the start – a novel approach in 2008. They were early adopters of platforms like DimDim and later Citrix GoToWebinar. They believed scalability was key and that online was crucial from the beginning.
"...from day one it was clear you know for us that scalability is going to be 1 of the key matric... the thought that ah we are going to do it online was there from day 1 absolutely day 1..."
Crucially, they priced online courses at par with classroom, signaling equal value.
"...from day one. The prices of online courses were at par with the classroom courses... It is the same thing. Except that the channel of... distribution media is online..."
Unique Faculty: Leveraged a network of industry professionals – bond traders teaching bonds, portfolio managers teaching valuation – delivering real-world insights over weekends.
"...our model was will get the right professionals conduct these classes over the weekends... by the time we went global we had around hundred classes running every weekend by professionals from the industry..."
Profitable Growth: EduPristine was bootstrapped and profitable for its first two years (2008-2010). This conservative, profit-focused DNA remained even after raising funds.
Funding: Attracted investment from notable names like Dr. Mark Mobius and Rajesh Sehgal (Equanimity Ventures) as angels, followed by a Series A round from Accel Partners around 2010-2011 when the company was already doing approximately half a million dollars in profitable revenue. They raised funds strategically:
"...initially when you try to run a new city or a new course... or you try to build a brand. Essentially you required to do a lot of investments in the beginning... that is when we essentially raised funds..."
Global Scale: Expanded rapidly across India and internationally (Middle East, Africa, SE Asia, US), leveraging their online platform and universal course appeal. At their peak, they were running nearly a thousand batches concurrently worldwide and became one of the largest training providers globally for certain finance certifications based on volume.
Impressive Metrics: Sustained an incredible 80%+ Year-over-Year growth for nearly a decade. They built robust operational processes and strong second-level leadership, ensuring the company wasn't dependent solely on the founders.
"In fact, nobody knew our name students didn know who the teachers are going to be... You just join an institution for the program and that's what we had built from day one."
The Successful Exit: The company's scale and profitability attracted strategic interest. In 2016, Becker Professional Education, part of Adtalem Global Education (NYSE: ATGE), made a strategic investment alongside a private equity fund. This culminated in a full acquisition by Adtalem, with Pawan and the founding team transitioning out by early 2018.
"We were very conservative founders... We never burned the hole in their pockets [investors']. We were always very conservative in the way we expanded... founders who tend to be conservative... they do not have that DNA to burn money."
EduPristine's journey wasn't about chasing unicorn valuations through cash burn; it was about building a fundamentally sound, profitable, and scalable global business – a testament to Pawan's strategic and operational leadership.
🤖 Shorthills AI: Building the Future with Generative AI (2018-Present)
After the successful EduPristine exit, Pawan wasn't ready to rest. The drive was to build something "meaningful," and the clear direction was technology, specifically the burgeoning field of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning.
"Build something you own meaningful I Think the word I use is meaningful... something of course which really needs to excite us."
In June 2018, Pawan Prabhat and Paramdeep Singh co-founded Shorthills AI.
The Mission: Shorthills AI operates at the intersection of Generative AI, LLMs, and enterprise needs. Their core belief, as stated by Pawan, is that "Generative AI will impact all businesses positively and it exists to serve business needs."
Key Focus Areas & Capabilities:
Enterprise Generative AI Solutions: Moving beyond generic chatbots, Shorthills AI tackles specific, complex business problems using AI. Examples discussed include:
Healthcare: Developing tools to automatically generate genetic pedigree charts from patient conversations, saving doctors valuable time.
Finance: Building systems to generate financial report narratives from data.
E-commerce: Creating virtual try-on solutions (handling complexities like Indian attire – sarees, lehengas) and analyzing millions of product reviews for platforms like their own BestViews Reviews.
Education: Building advanced curriculum generation tools.
Other: Contract analysis for oil companies, campaign creative generation for media companies.
Deep Tech Expertise: The team has hands-on experience working with the entire spectrum of NLP and ML models – from earlier techniques like word2vec and BERT to modern LLMs like GPT-Neo and transformer variants. They possess deep expertise in prompt engineering, fine-tuning, vectorization, and building robust data pipelines.
Addressing Enterprise Needs: Shorthills AI understands the critical requirements of enterprise clients, particularly around data privacy and security. They build solutions that can be deployed securely within a client's infrastructure (on-premise or private cloud) and emphasize the importance of the "human-in-the-loop" for quality control. Pawan highlighted the sensitivity around enterprise data:
"...when it comes to b two b space... corporates will never you know give their data or show their data to... anything outside the system... a bank says I would not train any outside system on my data that this guy becomes a smarter and smarter every day and I have to pay for every API call..."
Business Model: A flexible approach combining bespoke AI services, building custom solutions, and developing productized "accelerators" (partially built solutions customized for clients) and potentially full SaaS products.
Bootstrapped Growth: Like EduPristine initially, Shorthills AI is bootstrapped. Pawan mentioned on the podcast (in mid-2023) a team size of around 25 people with ambitious hiring plans, indicating significant traction and growth. They anticipate closing the financial year with revenues in the range of INR 4-5 Crores. He also emphasized the team structure needed:
"...in reality in machine learning or data science right? You still require seventy eighty percent normal data engineers and engineers... You still need to fetch the data you still need to your builder databases..."
The Vision: While currently offering services and accelerators, Pawan indicated their "heart lies in being a product-heavy company." The ultimate goal is to build meaningful, scalable technology products powered by their deep AI expertise.
"We knew from day one that if we're able to build this technology and engine smartly... it goes much much much more beyond [just product reviews]... the real power would lie if we crack the technology piece very clearly."
✨ Pawan Prabhat: The Technologist, Strategist & Leader
Pawan's journey reflects a unique combination of skills and philosophies:
Technical Depth: From his IIT Bombay roots and early software roles to becoming a LinkedIn Top AI Voice, he possesses a strong grasp of technology, particularly AI, Neural Networks, and Machine Learning.
Business Acumen: His IIM Indore MBA and experience in investment banking provide a sharp strategic and financial perspective.
Serial Execution: The success of EduPristine demonstrates his ability to build, scale, and lead organizations effectively, navigating funding, global expansion, and ultimately a successful exit.
Founder Philosophy: Emphasizes building "meaningful" ventures, focusing on profitability and sustainable growth ("conservative" approach), transparency in communication, and the importance of building strong teams and processes. He shared his thoughts on org building:
"...the more you are transparent and communicate with everyone all the stakeholders... just talking to people and listening to them... honestly I think that essentially go[es] the long way building an org..."
Thought Leadership: Actively contributes to the discourse on AI through publications and platforms like LinkedIn.
🚀 The Road Ahead
Pawan Prabhat's career is a compelling narrative of leveraging deep technical understanding to build scalable, impactful businesses. From identifying gaps in finance education to tackling complex enterprise challenges with Generative AI, his journey exemplifies strategic entrepreneurship.
With Shorthills AI, he and his team are not just riding the AI wave; they are building the engines to power it for businesses across the globe. As Generative AI continues to mature, leaders like Pawan Prabhat, with their blend of technical expertise and proven business-building experience, will be crucial in translating technological potential into tangible value.
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Until the next founder's thesis📕,
Your host, AD