
Exposed: $1.5B AI Startup Was Just 700 Indian Engineers Behind the Curtain
Builder.ai was supposed to be the future of software development. Founded in 2016 by Sachin Dev Duggal, the London-based startup promised a world where building apps was as simple as describing them. Users could type what they wanted, and the platform’s AI assistant—branded as “Natasha”—would take care of the rest, generating apps automatically, without needing a single line of human-written code. It was a compelling story. The company positioned itself as an AI-powered no-code solution that would democratize software creation, drastically reduce costs, and replace the need for large development teams. Investors bought in. Big names like Microsoft, SoftBank’s DeepCore, and the Qatar Investment Authority poured more than $450 million […]