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Tier-3 college to Shark Tank: Punjab-born founder builds ₹130 crore company in Bengaluru
Rahul Arora, in a conversation with Hindustantimes.com, recalled he was called “Rocket Singh” by Aman Gupta during his pitch on Shark Tank India.
From surviving rejections by major tech giants to building a ₹130 crore empire, one Punjab-born entrepreneur is proving that a degree from a Tier 3 college is no barrier to massive success. Armed with nothing but a second-hand laptop and an unshakeable work ethic inherited from his father, he successfully transformed a common corporate hiring bottleneck into a thriving tech platform. Speaking with Hindustantimes.com, Rahul Arora opened up about his journey, explaining how a casual, last-minute decision to apply for Shark Tank India ultimately led to a high-stakes bidding war and overnight national recognition.
While talking about where he was from, Arora shared, “My name is Rahul Arora, and I am originally from Ludhiana, Punjab. I come from a middle-class family where the expectation was to become an engineer or a doctor. I studied Electronics and Communication Engineering at a Tier 3 college in Jalandhar. I did not know how to code by my third year.”
How did his entrepreneurial journey begin?
Arora recalled, “Before starting Intervue, I worked at Mcat (Amcat) in both coding and sales, then as a Senior Software Engineer at Paytm. My last job was at Deutsche Telekom, where I was an engineering lead managing a large team.”
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He added, “We started the company in January 2021. The idea came from my time at Deutsche Telekom, where I took over 3,000 technical interviews. I noticed that 90 per cent of candidates were rejected even after clearing assessments, wasting thousands of engineering hours. We realised that if we could provide expert interviewers on demand, we could reduce hiring time from 45 days to just 7 days.” He founded his company with Pushpender Singh Rautela and Rahool Benji.
What happened next?
“I started with just ₹20,000 to buy a second-hand laptop because we could not code on company devices. Later, we raised a seed round of approximately ₹1 crore from Titan Capital (Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal) and Kunal Shah. The hurdles were constant: my first startup failed because I outsourced the tech, 15 people rejected our first job offers, and 11 engineers once ghosted us on their joining day,” Arora recalled.
“The resilience loop”
“I have a history with the founders who eventually backed me. In 2013, I was rejected by Snapdeal for a frontend role, and in 2014, I was rejected by Zomato for a sales job. Years later, the Snapdeal founders funded my vision, and the Zomato founder offered me ₹5 crores on national TV,” Arora said.
How much does he earn now?
According to Arora, his company has “touched approximately ₹30 crores in revenue runrate and is valued at ₹130 crores”. He continued, “We have conducted over 100,000+ interviews on the platform.”
Shark Tank India experience:
Arora told Hindustantimes.com, “I took the application very casually, filling the form just 2 hours before the deadline. The actual pitch lasted 1.5 hours, though only 18 minutes were aired. While Deepinder Goyal offered ₹5 crores, I chose to accept Aman Gupta's offer of ₹1.5 crore for 2 per cent equity to avoid excessive dilution.”
He continued, “My favourite memory is Aman Gupta calling me 'Rocket Singh' and Vinita Singh describing it as one of the sharpest pitches ever, and Deepinder saying I am a ditto copy of him. After the show aired, we saw a 20x jump in traffic and received four months' worth of inquiries in less than two weeks.”
Sharing more about his life and work ethic, the entrepreneur explained, “My dad is 65 plus and still works 12 hours a day, including Sundays. His work ethic is the reason I find working weekends normal.”
