I can’t believe it’s been 6 months into 2026. I can’t recollect where I was in January.
This month also marks the end of my Research Fellowship at Microsoft India. I will miss MSR. It was a comfortable place, I learned a lot and made friends I’ll carry forward.
For the next few months at least, I will be working on my new startup. Excited, but nervous too.
I haven’t written a single line of code manually in the last one year, it was all agents. Looking back from when I joined in 2024 to now, the capability gains have been exponential.
Why a startup? Why not a PhD or a new job?
A PhD means giving away 5 years of my life, and I am not ready for that yet. Being 29 and broke on foreign soil, working on something that could have zero shelf life given how fast AI is moving, didn’t appeal to me. I’d rather save it for a day when I truly find my niche.
As for a new job, I use coding agents every day. I don’t want to end up just prompting agents and relaying what they did to management.
There’s no better time to start something of my own. Software is cheap, you can churn out code faster than ever, and teams as small as 3 are raising millions. I didn’t want to work for someone else’s dream when I could be working on my own. If struggle is inevitable, let it be for me.
Looking back on six months
I visited London and Cyprus while travelling for the AAMAS Conference, it was a beautiful time.
I learned a fair bit about life these 6 months. My mom stayed with me during the summer holidays, and that was the best part.
So, to new beginnings.
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