You Won’t Believe What India’s Repeat Founders Are Building Now

India is entering a powerful new phase in its entrepreneurial story — one where building a company is no longer a once-in-a-lifetime sprint but a sustained, evolving profession. A growing tribe of founders is returning to the arena with sharper instincts, deeper scars, and far more ambitious visions. Their second innings are not mere sequels; they are reinventions that reflect shifting consumer behaviour, maturing capital markets, and a startup culture now ready for longevity over hype.

These founders are not just launching new companies. They are redrawing the map of modern entrepreneurship in India.

Anant Goel: The Fresh Commerce Trailblazer From Milkbasket to Handpickd

Anant Goel has always built for the most fundamental Indian routine: buying daily essentials. In 2015, he reimagined this habit with Milkbasket, a micro-delivery platform that brought milk and groceries to urban doorsteps before dawn. The model scaled with quiet precision, ultimately becoming one of India’s most efficient hyperlocal logistics successes. Reliance Retail’s acquisition of Milkbasket validated both its scale and its systems.

But Anant’s second innings is even more audacious.

With Handpickd, India’s first zero-stock fresh-produce platform, he is targeting the oldest—but least transformed—category in commerce: fruits and vegetables. Handpickd gives users unprecedented control over ripeness, size, texture and quality through its internal ‘match-making’ engine. Its zero-inventory and zero–dark-store model drastically cuts wastage, solving a problem that has plagued the sector for decades.

A fresh $15 million fundraise shows market conviction in its promise: purity, personalisation, and radical transparency at national scale.

Kunal Shah: The Behaviour Architect From FreeCharge to CRED

Kunal Shah has long believed that India’s economic potential lies in understanding human behaviour, not just technology. His first venture, FreeCharge, grew into one of the fastest-scaling consumer internet companies before being acquired by Snapdeal.

Then came CRED — the company that reframed financial discipline as a lifestyle choice.

CRED built a premium ecosystem for India’s most creditworthy users, merging payments, credit management, rewards, commerce, lending, travel, vehicles, and wealth services into a single design-led experience. Unlike mass fintech, CRED focuses on trust, aspiration, and habit formation.

With its recent expansion into new financial and lifestyle categories, CRED has become India’s most distinctive full-stack platform for responsible, affluent consumers.

Sanjeev Bikhchandani: The Ecosystem Builder From Naukri.com to a Startup Powerhouse

Sanjeev Bikhchandani’s first innings gave India Naukri.com, a company that defined early internet adoption and went on to become the country’s most trusted job portal. He took it public, built profitable adjacencies, and then expanded his mission to a much wider canvas.

Through Info Edge, Sanjeev has become one of India’s most influential startup backers. His second innings is not a company — it is a generation of companies. Info Edge has funded and mentored some of India’s biggest category leaders, including Zomato, Policybazaar, 99acres, and Shiksha.

Recent highlights such as Zomato’s turnaround and Policybazaar’s post-IPO stability underscore the long-term compounding effect of his patient capital and founder-first philosophy. Sanjeev represents the founder who evolves from builder to nation-scale enabler.

Binny Bansal: The Quiet Globaliser From Flipkart to OppDoor

After co-founding Flipkart and helping script the most celebrated acquisition in Indian startup history, Binny Bansal turned toward a different challenge — enabling Indian brands to win abroad.

His second innings, OppDoor, acts as an end-to-end cross-border commerce engine. From cataloging and warehousing to compliance, logistics and marketplace integrations, OppDoor simplifies exporting for Indian D2C brands that often struggle with the complexity of global e-commerce.

The company has already onboarded multiple emerging consumer brands and expanded operations across major US and European marketplaces. Binny’s shift from consumer-facing e-commerce to infrastructure-driven global enablement signals a mature, impact-first approach to entrepreneurship.

Mukesh Bansal: The Wellness Architect From Myntra to Cult.fit

Mukesh Bansal built Myntra into India’s leading fashion platform and the backbone of Flipkart’s fashion business. Most founders would have stopped there. Mukesh instead pivoted to a completely new landscape — health and wellbeing.

With Cult.fit, he is attempting to unify fitness centres, digital workouts, mental health, medical care, and nutrition into one integrated ecosystem. The brand stands out for blending technology with offline experiences, forming communities that stay and return.

Post-pandemic, Cult.fit has expanded aggressively, reopened centres across cities, acquired local fitness chains, and achieved profitability in key markets. Mukesh’s vision is transforming fitness from a transactional service into a lifestyle category with measurable outcomes.

Bhavish Aggarwal: The Tech Sovereigntist From Ola to Krutrim

Bhavish Aggarwal revolutionised mobility with Ola, scaling it into one of the largest ride-hailing players globally and pushing early adoption of electric vehicles in India.

His second innings, Krutrim, aims even higher — and deeper.

Krutrim is building India’s first complete AI stack: foundational large language models, AI chips, cloud infrastructure, and consumer-facing tools. Its goal is technological autonomy, ensuring India doesn’t remain dependent on global AI systems.

The company recently launched its first LLM tailored for Indian languages and announced progress on its indigenous hardware roadmap. Bhavish’s pivot from transportation to deep tech represents a rare founder willing to tackle national-scale technological challenges.

Sachin Bansal: The Financial Reformer From Flipkart to Navi

From co-founding Flipkart to watching it become India’s largest online retail acquisition, Sachin Bansal experienced scale like few others. In his second innings, he opted for depth instead.

Naviis his attempt to rebuild financial services from the ground up — simple, affordable, tech-driven, and built entirely in-house. Navi offers loans, insurance, and investment products engineered for clarity and low cost.

The company has grown its lending portfolio, expanded health and micro-insurance offerings, and strengthened compliance frameworks while seeking a banking license. Sachin’s mission is not just to digitise finance, but to make it truly accessible for millions entering the formal financial system.

A New Blueprint for India’s Entrepreneurial Future

This new generation of twice-successful founders shares a common thread, they treat entrepreneurship not as an event, but as a vocation.

Their second innings are sharper, more mission-driven, and increasingly aligned with India’s long-term needs - from fresh commerce and financial discipline to AI sovereignty and global brand expansion.

India’s startup ecosystem is growing up.
Its founders are too.

And together, they are crafting a new era where experience compounds, innovation matures, and entrepreneurship becomes a lifelong pursuit with national impact.