Sanjay Sehgal of Aziro on Building AI-Native Software Ecosystems, Agentic AI Transformation, and Scaling Intelligent Enterprises Globally

 StartupTalky presents Recap'25, a series of exclusive interviews where we connect with founders and industry leaders to reflect on their journey in 2025 and discuss their vision for the future.

In this edition of Recap’25, StartupTalky speaks with Sanjay Sehgal, Founder, Chairman & CEO of Aziro, who reflects on the rapid shift from traditional digital transformation to truly AI-native software ecosystems. Drawing from his experience working with global enterprises and high-growth ISVs, Sehgal explains why AI can no longer remain an add-on and must instead form the foundational layer of modern technology systems.

He goes on to discuss how Aziro is leading this transition through agentic AI–led transformation, multi-agent automation, and intelligent, self-healing software systems that are designed to think, adapt, and evolve. The conversation explores the industry’s inflection point with AI, Aziro’s strategic rebranding, the acquisition of Gopher Labs, and how embedding intelligence across the entire software lifecycle is enabling scalable, outcome-driven impact. Sehgal also shares insights into Aziro’s growth strategy, AI-powered internal platforms, and the company’s vision for building resilient, autonomous technology ecosystems for the future.

StartupTalky:  What service does Aziro provide? What was the motivation/vision with which you started?

Sanjay Sehgal: We are an AI-native software engineering and technology transformation company that partners with global enterprises and high-growth ISVs to build and scale intelligent software ecosystems.

The core motivation behind starting this journey was simple yet ambitious: to accelerate AI-native innovation and fundamentally transform how businesses operate, compete, and grow. From day one, we believed that AI should not be an add-on, but the foundation of modern digital systems.

Our approach has always been deeply partnership-driven. We work closely with our clients to deliver meaningful, long-term impact by combining AI-powered capabilities with strong, disciplined engineering talent.

Our services span AI/ML, hybrid and multi-cloud engineering, cognitive infrastructure engineering, DevSecOps, autonomous QA, analytics, FinTech, intelligent and storage systems, and digital software engineering and modernization, everything designed to help organizations confidently embrace an AI-native future.

StartupTalky: What new services have been added in the past year? What is/are the USP/s of your service?

Sanjay Sehgal: Over the past year, our focus has shifted decisively toward Agentic AI–led technology transformation. We are increasingly partnering with enterprises that want their software systems to think, adapt, and evolve rather than simply execute predefined workflows.

As part of this shift, we’ve introduced several AI-driven services designed to address real-world challenges such as system resilience, security threats, and operational agility. These include multi-agent–powered automation, intelligent and self-healing software systems, AI-driven DevSecOps, RAG-enabled support and operations, and AI-based TestSmart automation. In parallel, we’ve strengthened our capabilities in user experience engineering and enterprise-grade cybersecurity to ensure these intelligent systems are secure, scalable, and practical in production environments.

What truly differentiates us is how these services come together. We don’t offer AI as a standalone tool or point solution. Instead, we embed intelligence across the entire software lifecycle, combining AI-powered capabilities with deep engineering expertise to deliver transformation at scale. This cohesive, outcome-driven approach gives our clients confidence that they are investing in solutions that are comprehensive, reliable, and built for long-term impact.

StartupTalky: How has the industry you are in changed in recent years, and how has Aziro adapted to these changes?

Sanjay Sehgal: Over the last few years, the industry has gone through a profound shift. We reached a clear inflection point with the rapid and widespread impact of AI, fundamentally changing how software is built, operated, and evolved.

Early on, we recognized that the future would belong to AI-native technology transformation, especially for ISVs, unicorns, and Fortune 500 companies looking to move beyond traditional digital initiatives. In response, we deliberately evolved our services to place Artificial Intelligence, particularly agentic AI, at the very core of everything we offer.

This shift represents more than just new capabilities. It reflects our commitment to agility, continuous innovation, and building intelligent, autonomous, and scalable technology ecosystems that can adapt in real time to business needs.

Earlier this year, we also rebranded to Aziro, a move that clearly signals this strategic transformation. The rebrand communicates to our clients, partners, and employees that AI is not an add-on for us; it is our core DNA and the lens through which we design, build, and deliver technology in the future.

At the same time, we remain deeply committed to supporting our existing clients and partners through this transition, ensuring continuity, trust, and sustained value while helping them evolve alongside us.

StartupTalky: What key metrics do you track to check the Aziro's growth and performance?

Sanjay Sehgal: We track a focused set of metrics that guide our strategic decision-making and give us a clear view of both growth and execution.

Revenue growth remains a primary indicator of market confidence and demand for our services. Alongside that, customer retention and CSAT are critical measures of trust and consistency in how we deliver value. We also look closely at strategic milestones, such as the acquisition of Gopher Labs, which reflect our intent to scale thoughtfully. These moves expand our capabilities, accelerate our AI roadmap, and position us for the next phase of growth.

Finally, pipeline velocity helps us assess momentum, how effectively we are converting opportunity into real-world impact. Taken together, these metrics provide a balanced and comprehensive view of current performance while keeping us focused on sustainable, long-term growth.

StartupTalky: What were the most significant challenges your company faced in the past year, and how did you overcome them?

Sanjay Sehgal: The past year marked an important and demanding phase in Aziro’s natural evolution. As the technology landscape continued to mature, client expectations shifted decisively toward AI-led, outcome-driven solutions. One of our key challenges was evolving our offerings to meet these changing needs while maintaining delivery stability, quality, and trust with our clients.

Another significant challenge was scaling the organization thoughtfully. This included the acquisition of Gopher Labs, bringing teams together, aligning capabilities, and establishing shared ways of working. Doing this well required focus, clarity, and strong leadership to ensure that growth did not come at the expense of culture or execution.

We addressed these challenges by staying deeply connected to our clients, investing in the right skills and AI-native capabilities, and maintaining a strong discipline around execution. As a result, Aziro emerged stronger, more aligned, and better positioned to support our clients in their next phase of growth and transformation.

StartupTalky: What are the different strategies you use for marketing? Tell us about any growth hack that you pulled off.

Sanjay Sehgal: Our marketing strategy begins with a deep understanding of customer pain points. Making prospects and customers feel heard and understood is fundamental to how we engage. We focus on solving complex technology challenges with clarity and precision, rather than chasing short-term trends or noise in the market.

Over time, this approach has helped us build strong credibility and trust, which has naturally translated into reputation-led growth and word-of-mouth, arguably the most sustainable form of growth in our industry.

From a strategic perspective, we rely on a focused mix of account-based marketing, thought leadership, and referral-led growth, rather than mass marketing. By sharing real-world insights, practical use cases, and client perspectives, we aim to demonstrate value even before a sales conversation begins. This has helped us attract the right customers, shorten sales cycles, and grow with purpose.

If there’s a “growth hack” in our journey, it’s this: consistent execution and authenticity. When you stay close to your customers and deliver outcomes that matter, growth tends to follow naturally.

StartupTalky: What opportunities do you see for future growth in your industry in India and the world?

Sanjay Sehgal: The most significant opportunity ahead lies in the global shift toward AI-native and intelligent technology ecosystems. Organizations are moving beyond experimentation and are now looking to operationalize AI across core business functions in a meaningful, scalable way.

India is uniquely positioned in this transition. Its depth of engineering talent, combined with rapidly increasing enterprise adoption of AI, makes the country a natural hub for global innovation and next-generation technology services. This creates a strong opportunity not just for outsourcing, but for co-creating intelligent platforms and solutions for the world.

Globally, there is also sustained momentum around modernizing legacy systems, implementing intelligent automation, and enabling data-driven decision-making at scale. Companies that can bring together deep domain understanding, AI capabilities, and strong engineering discipline will continue to see long-term growth across industries and geographies.

StartupTalky: What are the important tools and software you use to run your business smoothly?

Sanjay Sehgal: We use a combination of modern enterprise tools and internally developed platforms to run the business efficiently. An important part of our approach is applying the same AI-native thinking internally that we deliver to our customers.

We’ve built in-house platforms such as Cawi AI and Aziron to streamline and support internal operations. These platforms enable LLM-based, intelligent workflows across sales, marketing, engineering, operations, and HR by improving visibility, decision-making, and execution efficiency.

Our focus is not on automation for its own sake, but on building systems that help teams work faster, collaborate more effectively, and make better-informed decisions. This internal adoption of AI has enabled us to scale with discipline while maintaining quality, consistency, and accountability across the organization.

StartupTalky: How are you using AI, whether in service delivery, internal processes, or customer experience, and what impact has it created?

Sanjay Sehgal: We use AI across three broad areas: service delivery, internal operations, and customer experience.

In service delivery, AI helps our teams accelerate development cycles, improve quality, and make better engineering and architectural decisions. It enables more intelligent automation and supports faster, more reliable execution.

Across internal operations, our next-generation AI platforms support functions such as sales, marketing, operations, and HR. These systems improve visibility, decision-making, and overall operational efficiency, allowing teams to focus on higher-value work.

From a customer experience perspective, AI enables faster response times, more proactive engagement, and greater transparency across projects and delivery milestones.

The overall impact has been improved execution speed, higher customer satisfaction, and a more scalable operating model, without adding unnecessary complexity. As I mentioned earlier, our in-house platforms, CAWi AI and Aziron, have played a key role in helping us embed AI seamlessly across service delivery, internal operations, and customer experience.

StartupTalky: How do you plan to expand the Customers, service offering, and team base in the future?

Sanjay Sehgal: Our approach to growth starts with deepening relationships with our existing clients. We aim to be long-term partners to organizations,both current and new, that are looking to embed intelligent, AI-native capabilities into their core operations.

Our strategic roadmap, AI for Customers, AI for Technology, and AI for Business guides how we expand our service offerings and deliver measurable, outcomes-driven value. This framework helps us stay focused on where AI can create the most meaningful impact for our clients.

Geographically, we plan to expand into new markets, with a strong focus on India and Japan, as we build the next phase of our global customer base.

From a people and capability standpoint, we are investing in Centers of Excellence to develop future-ready skills and nurture specialized talent. As we scale our teams and footprint, our priority remains disciplined growth, ensuring that capability, culture, and execution evolve together. This balanced approach positions us well to lead the next phase of technology-led transformation sustainably.

StartupTalky: One tip that you would like to share with another Service company founder?

Sanjay Sehgal: Focus relentlessly on solving real customer problems before scaling. Sustainable growth comes from trust, consistent delivery quality, and measurable outcomes. Build depth in your capabilities, stay close to your customers, and avoid chasing every trend.

Explore more Recap'25 interviews here.