The Indian IT services market, a colossal 20 lakh crore industry, stands on the cusp of a major transformation, driven by Artificial Intelligence. Amidst this disruption, a Hyderabad-based startup called Hyzen, co-founded by Aman and Abhilasha, presented a groundbreaking vision on Shark Tank India: to build software ten times faster and at a fraction of the cost, leveraging an innovative blend of AI and human ingenuity.

Addressing the Software Development Conundrum

Hyzen’s founders highlighted a critical inefficiency in traditional software development. While many believe coding is the primary task, it accounts for only about 30% of the effort. The bulk of the work – 70% – involves crucial stages like requirements gathering, meetings, scoping, and extensive testing, which often consume weeks or even months. This extended timeline and high cost create significant barriers for businesses seeking digital solutions.

Moreover, Hyzen identified an underutilized talent pool in India: skilled AI-native engineers who may not come from top-tier colleges but are equally competent and, with AI, can even outcompete experienced engineers. These individuals often remain overlooked and undervalued, a gap Hyzen aims to bridge.

Hyzen’s Vision: The AI-Powered SDLC Platform

Hyzen positions itself as an AI-powered Full SDLC (Software Development Life Cycle) platform. Their vision extends beyond mere coding; it encompasses the entire software creation journey, from initial planning to final deployment and testing, all orchestrated within their proprietary platform. This end-to-end automation, combined with the expertise of their “human AI-native engineers,” promises lightning-fast delivery, significantly reduced costs, and enterprise-grade quality.

The company’s approach is to automate 80-90% of the development process, allowing a smaller team of engineers to achieve scale comparable to large IT services companies like Infosys. Their business model is outcome-based, following a sprint-based weekly structure. Clients pay for weekly outcomes, allowing them flexibility to continue or discontinue services based on satisfaction.

The Hyzen Workflow: From Idea to Implementation in Minutes

Hyzen demonstrated a seamless process:

1. An enterprise discovers Hyzen and sets up a meeting.
2. Hyzen’s human team and AI agents join the meeting to understand requirements.
3. Within minutes, the Hyzen platform generates a detailed product plan, including user stories, acceptance criteria, and high-level features – a process that traditionally takes weeks or months.
4. Once the plan is approved, the user stories are pulled into the development environment.
5. Upon feature completion, the project moves to the testing phase, often the most time-consuming part. Hyzen’s AI generates test cases and executes them on the UI, producing a final report for engineers and clients.

This process is enabled by an internally developed “leverage platform” that generates product notes from meetings, using sophisticated prompt and context engineering to understand project specifics and decisions.

Impressive Traction and Financials

Hyzen’s financial performance underscored their rapid growth and efficiency:

• Last year’s revenue was approximately 75 lakhs.
• This year, they had already achieved 3.15 crore in revenue, with an expected close of 7.5 to 8 crore – a remarkable 10x growth.
• Monthly revenue grew by 25% over the last three months, reaching 62 lakhs last month and projected 75 lakhs this month.
• The company operates at an impressive 48% EBITDA margin, with 34% of revenue invested in talent, 8% in operational costs, 8% in corporate overheads (including founder salaries), and just 2% on marketing.
• They reported a net profit of 20 lakhs last month (November).
• With 30 active clients and 27 engineers, Hyzen boasts a near 90% monthly client retention rate and 84% over three months.
• Their average annual contract value is around $10,000, typically involving 10 weeks of work per customer. They have also secured larger contracts, including a three-year deal worth 36 lakhs per year with an Indian FMCG client.
• Revenue distribution is two-thirds from the US and one-third from India.

The Shark Tank Pitch and Deal

Aman and Abhilasha sought 90 lakhs for 1% equity in Hyzen. The pitch sparked a lively discussion among the Sharks regarding their competitive moat, with founders emphasizing their unique approach to leveraging AI-native talent.

While some sharks like Anupam Mittal and Peyush Bansal expressed concerns about the scalability of talent as a moat and potential margin squeeze, they acknowledged the strong founder-market fit and the future of AI+Human collaboration. Other sharks, including Amit Jain, Namita Thapar, and Ritesh Agarwal, were impressed by the founders’ vision and execution.

Ultimately, a deal was sealed with Amit Jain, who offered 90 lakhs for 2% equity in Hyzen, a testament to the potential he saw in the company and its founders. This investment will undoubtedly fuel Hyzen’s journey to deliver Indian software at light speed and reshape the global IT services landscape.