Bhavin Turakhia Stakes $30M of His Own Cash on an AI Office Rival

The News

Bhavin Turakhia, the 46-year-old serial entrepreneur behind Directi, Radix, Titan and the banking-software firm Zeta, is putting $30 million of his own money into a new venture called Neo, TechCrunch reported. It is his fifth company, and the target is one of the most entrenched markets in software: the everyday office suite.

Neo bundles project management, documents, file storage and native AI into a single work platform. Rather than lock users into one model, the product is deliberately model-agnostic, letting enterprises switch between AI providers as prices and capabilities shift. Turakhia has bootstrapped the whole effort himself, sidestepping venture capital entirely.

The company built its first platform in three months and launched internally in April 2026, with a rollout to mid-sized businesses in technology, consulting and professional services planned over the coming months. Neo currently runs on 45 staff, 18 of them engineers, and expects to reach roughly 100 people by year-end.

Turakhia is candid about the scale of the ambition. "Even if we end up with 2% to 5% market share, that's larger than anything I've built so far," he told TechCrunch.

Why It Matters

The productivity-suite market is a graveyard for challengers. Microsoft Office and Google Workspace command the default, and a long line of well-funded rivals has learned how sticky that default is. Neo is also wading in against Notion, Superhuman and the AI features that Microsoft, Google and Salesforce are now stitching into their own products.

Turakhia's wager is that AI resets the board. "If you want to build an iPhone, you can't take the parts of a Nokia and convert it into an iPhone," he said, arguing that bolting assistants onto legacy software is fundamentally different from designing around AI from the first line of code. It is a familiar disruptor's bet, and history is mixed: the last time a founder tried to unseat Office head-on, most attempts stalled at the distribution layer rather than the feature set.

What makes this one worth watching is the funding structure. A $30 million self-funded round buys patience that venture money rarely allows. There is no clock ticking towards a Series B, no board pressing for aggressive burn. That freedom is precisely what a decade-long assault on incumbents demands.

Indian Angle

For India, Neo lands in a pointed context. Turakhia is one of the country's most prolific technology founders, and his bootstrapped playbook echoes the most successful Indian software story of all: Zoho, Sridhar Vembu's self-funded office suite that has quietly built a global business without outside capital. Neo effectively pits one Indian-origin, profit-first philosophy against the same incumbents Zoho has chipped at for years.

That matters for Indian enterprises weighing their software stack. Home-grown, model-agnostic tooling speaks directly to cost-conscious mid-market firms in Bengaluru, Pune and Gurugram that balk at per-seat dollar pricing and want the freedom to route AI workloads to cheaper models. It also aligns with MeitY's broader push for indigenous enterprise software and reduced dependence on a handful of foreign platforms.

There is a talent signal too. A founder assembling an 18-strong engineering core and doubling headcount within a year is competing for exactly the AI-fluent Indian engineers that global labs are courting with dollar salaries. Whether ventures like Neo can retain that talent at rupee economics is the quiet test beneath the headline.

FAQ

What is Neo?

Neo is an AI-first work platform that combines project management, documents, file storage and native AI assistance in one system. It is designed to be model-agnostic, meaning businesses can switch between different AI providers rather than being tied to a single vendor.

How much has Turakhia invested?

He has committed $30 million of his own money and bootstrapped the venture, taking no outside venture capital. Neo is his fifth company after Directi, Radix, Titan and Zeta.

Who is Neo competing against?

Microsoft Office and Google Workspace are the primary targets, alongside Notion and Superhuman, plus the AI features Microsoft, Google and Salesforce are embedding into their own workplace software.

When will it be available?

Neo launched internally in April 2026 and plans to roll out to mid-sized businesses in technology, consulting and professional services over the coming months.

Where can I read the original report?

The story was first reported by TechCrunch, linked in full below.

This story was reported by TechCrunch. Read the full original coverage at TechCrunch.