Dharmesh Shah

Founder and CTO at HubSpot. Helping millions grow better.

Career startup guy.

Author of the book &quot;Inbound Marketing&quot; (http://InboundBook.com)

Specialties: Entrepreneurship, Software Development, internet marketing,SEO

Founder and CTO

Founder of HubSpot, a venture-backed software startup.  HubSpot offers the industry's first inbound marketing system for small businesses.  The software is available as a hosted service (SaaS).

"Why should companies pay for SaaS (HR/CRM/ERP/etc.) when they could just vibe code them?"

I get variations of this question or comment with some regularity (granted, it's sometimes just me talking to myself). 

Here are some biased (but hopefully, well-considered) thoughts:

1) I am a big proponent and user of vibe coding (what I call "agentic coding"). I do it every day, 7 days a week, including Sundays. It's amazing.

2) My company, HubSpot is a software company. We have hundreds of professional engineers -- just about all of them use AI for product development too. They are brilliant and know how to build production-grade products.

3) Even with this powerful army of talent, the number of internal, core SaaS applications that we have replaced with a vibe-coded variant is exactly ZERO. The number of applications we plan to replace is also exactly ZERO. 

4) It's not the absence of talent that keeps us from rolling our own SaaS apps, it's the presence of focus. It would be silly to try and replace our HR, team collaboration, expense tracking and 100+ other SaaS apps we use when we can just buy them. Just doesn't make sense.

5) That's us -- as a software company at some scale. If you're a non-software company it makes even less sense for you. Doesn't matter how good the AI coding tools get. Let's say you *could* vibe code a replacement for that SaaS app you're using, who's going to maintain it? Who's going to keep up with industry trends? What are you going to do when the 20-something genius that vibe coded it over a weekend leaves the company?  Who do you call when there's a major bug? 

6) If you're a Fortune 500 company at some scale, perhaps you could pull this off for some discrete use cases and the tradeoffs are worth it. You have an IT/Engineering department that is larger than the population of some countries.  You can take on the pain in return for the positives.

For the millions of others, my advice is:

Spend every calorie possible on creating value for your customers.

Never spend more time debating the priority of a product improvement than it would take to actually go ahead and do it. 

Small improvements add-up and they're morale boosters for both customers and the team.

In the early times at HubSpot we had something called "daily delights". Basically, every day, the product team would *ship* at least ONE small improvement to the product that was noticeable by customers (and hopefully delight a few of them).

We're bringing a variation of that idea back whereby we find and fix those minor annoyances in the HubSpot product and drive some customer delight. I'm thrilled. 

Sometimes companies have a tendency to overthink things and undervalue the compounding value of seemingly inconsequential improvements.

BREAKING:  OpenAI launches GPT 5.2 and boy is it smart.

I got immediate value out of it.

I was struggling with getting Codex CLI to work through a tricky coding (actually deployment) issue I was running into.  I was going back and forth with the coding agent for almost a dozen rounds -- to no avail.

Was even desperate enough to try Claude Code with Opus 4.5.  No luck.

Then, saw the news about GPT 5.2.  Switched to it.  It took a couple of more rounds of prompting -- but it solved the issue.

Look forward to digging in more tonight with a late-night coding session for a major overhaul of one of my popular agents. 

Thank you OpenAI!

I build a lot of AI agents for myself, which I increasingly also share with others. 

I don't build AI agents to make people unnecessary.

I build them to make people unstoppable.

The latest McKinsey State of AI 2025 report just dropped and I'll cautiously say it's pretty good. (Cautiously, because I'm a bit leery of reports from big management consulting companies -- they're often very mega-enterprise focused and I'm a startup/SMB guy.)

Some quick takes and insights:

1. Most companies are still “AI-curious,” not “AI-capable.”

Eighty-eight percent are using AI somewhere, but two-thirds are still stuck in pilot mode. Translation: lots of glitter, not much gold.

2. AI agents are the new interns.

Sixty-two percent of organizations are experimenting with agents, but only 10 percent have them doing real work at scale. Early days—but the ones that figure it out first will have an army of tireless digital doers.

3. High performers think beyond cost-cutting.

The top six percent of companies don’t just use AI to save money—they use it to reinvent workflows and drive innovation. They’re not trimming fat; they’re growing new muscle.

My advice:
Experiment and play with AI. That's how you learn.
But don't stop there.
Lean in and truly leverage it.
Even if it's for small, discrete tasks.

The next frontier isn’t “using AI.”
 It’s working with AI.

At HubSpot we're investing in helping millions of SMBs make this transition -- just like we've done in the past. Everything from our featured agents like Customer Agent and Prospecting Agent all the way down to simple, task-oriented agents on Agent.ai.  

We're not interested in high-falutin', performative AI.  We focus on the practical: What can AI actually *do* for you?

What's the difference between a company's mission and vision?

Here's how I think about it...

A mission states who the company is, what it is pursuing and why.  It's describes what is (hopefully) happening *today*.

A vision describes where the company is going, what direction it's moving and where it aspires to be in the *future*.

For example, HubSpot's mission is to "help millions grow better". So, everything we do can be connected back to that mission. The products we build, the underlying platform it uses, our partner ecosystem, HubSpot Academy, our free tools, Agent.ai, our INBOUND conference...everything. It's all in service of that core mission of helping millions grow better. 

So, what's our VISION? Candidly, we're currently iterating on it. With the advent of AI, we think we can be more aspirational and set a higher bar in terms of what we can accomplish.

StepUp.One

𝗪𝗵𝘆 𝗪𝗲'𝗿𝗲 𝗗𝗶𝗳𝗳𝗲𝗿𝗲𝗻𝘁:

Unlike conventional AI providers, StepUp.One blends tailored AI technology with strategic human intervention, ensuring every output directly contributes to clear, measurable outcomes.

Our Core Belief: 𝗛𝘂𝗺𝗮𝗻 + 𝗔𝗜 = 𝗢𝘂𝘁𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲𝘀

Our distinctive approach ensures tangible impact for startups, scale-ups, and Fortune 500 enterprises alike.

🎯 𝗦𝗼𝗹𝘂𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀

Start-Ups: Delivering traction & capital
Scale-Ups: Accelerating growth through elastic Teams
Enterprises: Innovating within established corporations to drive agility
Venture Accelerator: Swift validation of ideas to investment readiness.
Impact Accelerator: Aligning purpose-driven initiatives with profitable growth.

🎯 𝗚𝗧𝗠 (𝗚𝗼-𝗧𝗼-𝗠𝗮𝗿𝗸𝗲𝘁)

Lead Generation: Creating meaningful connections to build a robust sales pipeline.
Demand Generation: Accelerating targeted visibility and engagement.
Employee Marketing: Turning employees into brand advocates.
Influencer Marketing: Leveraging influential voices to amplify reach.
New Account Opening: Initiating and nurturing key account opportunities.
Large Deals Sourcing: Targeting high-value opportunities and partnerships.

🎯 𝗙𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗿𝗮𝗶𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗴

Pre-Seed: Securing initial capital for groundbreaking ideas.
Series A: Scaling proven startups with robust funding rounds.
Crowdfunding: Mobilizing community-driven financial support.
Investor Relations: Maintaining proactive relationships with strategic investors.
Investor Chatbot: AI-driven, real-time investor interaction and insights.

🎯 𝗘𝘅𝗲𝗰𝘂𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲𝘀

Transform CXO: Elevating executive visibility and global industry influence.
Transform Sales: Enhancing sales teams to create deeper, strategic customer relationships.
Transform Marketing: Positioning marketing teams as authoritative voices in their industry.

𝗡𝗼𝘁𝗮𝗯𝗹𝗲 𝗢𝘂𝘁𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲𝘀:

1000+ successful GTM engagements executed.
200+ fundraising campaigns resulting in significant capital secured.

Founder & CEO

Human-Edge.ai

While building StepUp.One, we discovered something powerful:
The real value isn't in the AI tools - it's in how you combine them with human grit.
Human-Edge.ai empowers individuals and businesses to stay ahead in an AI-driven world. 

Forget the 90% playing with AI without business results or the 10% using blind automation. 
Our Top 1% approach fuses custom AI, expert orchestration, and dynamic optimization to deliver profound business impact:

1. Build: Custom AI Foundation: We create custom AI engines tailored to your unique context, data, and voice—think AI that drafts proposals in your exact style. Each bespoke engine is guided by a strategic playbook crafted specifically to achieve your targets.

2. Orchestrate: Expert Human Execution: Our seasoned experts actively manage your AI engine and playbook, injecting human grit, strategic insight, and adaptability essential for navigating complexity and achieving sustained business outcomes.

3. Optimize: Continuous Performance Loop: Both our AI systems and expert orchestrators continuously analyze performance data. This shared insight drives relentless refinement of AI parameters and human strategies, maximizing KPI performance and ensuring ongoing business impact.

Our innovative solutions have enabled businesses from startups to global enterprises to dominate their markets through AI-powered sales, marketing, recruiting, fundraising, and strategic growth.

Founder

Mynusco

Imagine replacing plastic with crop waste, at scale, today.
Not in labs. Not in pilots. In real products, real supply chains, real impact.

𝗧𝗵𝗮𝘁'𝘀 𝗠𝘆𝗻𝘂𝘀𝗰𝗼'𝘀 𝗿𝗲𝘃𝗼𝗹𝘂𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻:

𝗧𝘄𝗼 𝗕𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗸𝘁𝗵𝗿𝗼𝘂𝗴𝗵 𝗧𝗲𝗰𝗵𝗻𝗼𝗹𝗼𝗴𝗶𝗲𝘀:

1. BioDur: For durable products that need recycling
  - Car components
  - Furniture
  - Long-lasting consumer goods

2. BioPur: For single-use items that need composting
  - Cutlery
  - Plates
  - Food packaging

𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗚𝗮𝗺𝗲-𝗖𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗜𝗻𝗻𝗼𝘃𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻:
- Up to 50% plastic replacement with crop waste
- Net negative carbon footprint
- Lower cost than traditional plastics
- Plug-and-play with existing manufacturing

𝗜𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗰𝘁 𝗮𝘁 𝗦𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗲:
- 200+ product formulations developed
- Seamless integration into current supply chains
- From toothbrushes to car parts
- Zero infrastructure change needed

𝗔𝗱𝘃𝗶𝘀𝗼𝗿𝘆 𝗙𝗼𝗰𝘂𝘀:
- Strategic growth planning
- Market expansion
- Technology commercialization
- Supply chain optimization

𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗕𝗶𝗴 𝗣𝗶𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗲:
While others talk about plastic alternatives tomorrow,
Mynusco delivers them today.
While others require new infrastructure,
We work with what exists.
While others increase costs,
We make sustainability affordable.

Join us in making plastic-free not just possible, but practical.

Board Advisor

Infosys

Two decades of transforming global enterprises through technology innovation.

𝗠𝗮𝗷𝗼𝗿 𝗕𝘂𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗧𝗿𝗮𝗻𝘀𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗺𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀:

1. Tennis Revolution
  Roland-Garros & ATP World Tour Transformation
  - Built tennis's first open-source poly cloud platform
  - Transformed how players use data
  - Revolutionized fan experience through AI
  - Reinvented sports journalism with data storytelling

2. Industrial Innovation
  Krti 4.0 with Poyry & Nokia
  - Created AI framework for operational excellence
  - Unlocked value from obsolete technology
  - Solved the retiring workforce challenge
  - Transformed industrial asset management

3. Digital Staffing Pioneer
  Adia with Adecco Group
  - Built mobile-first staffing platform
  - Revolutionized on-demand workforce
  - Transformed e-commerce, logistics, retail staffing
  - Created a new digital business model

𝗟𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗽 𝗜𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗰𝘁:
- Led Energy, Resources & Services verticals globally
- Drove 30% of European Financial Services revenue
- Managed 10% of European revenue through Enterprise Solutions
- Pioneered AI and blockchain adoption in the energy sector

𝗧𝗵𝗼𝘂𝗴𝗵𝘁 𝗟𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗽:
World Economic Forum, Davos
- Platform Economy's role in wealth democratization
- Quantifying human empathy in the digital age

𝗚𝗹𝗼𝗯𝗮𝗹 𝗘𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗴𝘆 𝗙𝗼𝗿𝘂𝗺𝘀
- Digitization's impact on energy (Budapest Summit)
- AI & blockchain in energy (InnoEnergy)
- Technology frontiers (World Energy Congress Istanbul)

Head of Energy, Resources and Services Verticals for Europe

Head of Consulting & System Integration, Financial Services and Insurance, Europe

Responsible for hunting and farming across SAP, Oracle, IBM, Microsoft, TIBCO and PEGA

Head of Enterprise Solutions, Europe

Implemented an $800 million Global Payments and Cash Utility for an investment bank

Microsoft Program Manager

Responsible for Engineering, Marketing and Support for a suite of TIBCO products

TIBCO Product Manager

Becton Dickinson

SAP Project Manager

Eicher

Implemented SAP for Royal Enfield Motors followed by Eicher Tractors, Eicher Motors, Ramon & Demm and Eicher GoodEarth

SAP Consultant

I am pioneering the Future of Reskilling, at global scale, with urgency, and with a clear blueprint to prepare humanity for the AI age.

Across Fortune 500 boardrooms and refugee camps alike, the need is the same: talent that is AI-literate, outcomes-driven, and future-ready. That’s where I focus my life’s work.

With two decades of leadership at Infosys across the Americas and Europe, I’ve led transformation at the intersection of business, technology, and human capital. But in 2019, I turned that experience toward a more ambitious goal: to reskill and employ 1 million underserved individuals, especially youth in refugee camps and overlooked communities, using AI not just as a tool, but as a force multiplier for economic mobility.

Today, through StepUp.One and Human-Edge.ai, I’m building a new kind of workforce infrastructure, one that is digital, distributed, and deeply human. We partner with global enterprises, development agencies, and impact-focused leaders to deliver results, not just programs.

At the heart of our model is a 3-part Reskilling Formula designed for real-world ROI:

Master the Topic – This is where Today’s Learners Stop when they get their certificates.

Master the Skill – Apply the knowledge to deliver outputs. Use AI to amplify your results.

Master the Outcome – Drive Outcomes from Outputs. When they don’t come, Change your strategy, structure and execution.

This framework works equally well for a VP in New York, a jobseeker in Nairobi, or a student in São Paulo. It bridges the global reskilling gap not with hype, but with orchestration—pairing advanced AI agents with trained human operators to deliver performance at scale.

Our conviction is simple but radical:

Human + AI = Outcomes

But reskilling is only the starting point.

We go further by embedding this trained talent into AI-powered delivery pods that support everything from enterprise sales and marketing to fundraising, recruiting, and digital operations.
Whether it’s helping a Silicon Valley startup scale faster, or enabling a Fortune 500 firm to enter a new market with agility, our model proves this: underserved populations, when equipped with AI and structured support, can outperform traditional teams at a fraction of the cost.

If your mandate is to lead transformation—across markets, models, or mindsets—let’s talk. Because the future of work isn’t just about automation. It’s about inclusion, leverage, and creating a globally distributed workforce that wins.

Let’s build that future—together.

Mohamed Anis

Every founder hears it: "Come back when you have more traction." But how do you get traction without capital?

UNPOPULAR OPINION: Cold emailing 500 random VCs is the WORST fundraising strategy.

Yet 90% of founders do exactly this...

And wonder why they get ghosted.

Here's what I learned after watching hundreds of startups screw this up:

The problem isn't your pitch deck.

It's that you're pitching to investors who don't even invest in your space.

THE SMART FOUNDER'S FRAMEWORK:

Instead of spraying and praying to every VC on Crunchbase...

We find the 80 investors ALREADY hunting for what you're building.

Here's how it works:

1️⃣ RESEARCH PHASE
Map investors who've written cheques in your sector in the last 18 months.
Not 5 years ago. RECENTLY.

2️⃣ VALIDATION PHASE
Check their portfolio companies.
Read their tweets and blog posts.
Find the ones literally saying "we need more X" (where X = your thing).

3️⃣ WARM INTRO PHASE
Get introduced through their existing portfolio companies.
Or find mutual connections on LinkedIn.
Cold email is your LAST resort.

THE RESULTS:

❌ Random cold emails: 1% response rate
✅ Targeted warm intros: 26% response rate

The difference?

You're walking into meetings knowing they WANT to invest.

They're not doing you a favour by taking the call.

You're solving a problem they're actively looking to solve.

Here's the truth nobody tells you...

VCs get 1,000+ pitches per month.

99% are irrelevant to what they're hunting for.

Don't be part of the noise.

Be the signal they've been waiting for.

Your turn:

Who are the 10 investors most likely to fund your exact business model right now?

99% of pre-seed startups don’t fail to raise because their product is bad. They fail because they’re playing the wrong game.

Bill Gates’ greatest invention isn’t Windows or Microsoft.

It’s an institution so trusted that billionaires now outsource their conscience to it.

 An organisation that can credibly say:

“We’ll deploy your money 100x better than you ever will. So give it to us.”

That’s the legacy history will remember.

Chair, Gates Foundation and Founder, Breakthrough Energy

The foundation’s annual employee meeting is always one of my favorite days of the year. This was my first time seeing everyone since I announced that I will give away virtually all of my wealth through the Gates Foundation over the next 20 years to save and improve lives around the world. ​

I feel confident putting the remainder of my wealth into the foundation, because I know how brilliant and dedicated the people responsible for using that money are—and it was wonderful getting a chance to celebrate them. https://lnkd.in/gRVnA-vx

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The Battle

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Mohamed Anis

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Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Dharmesh Shah's LinkedIn Performance

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