Grants backer
ElevenLabs
Why this matters
Audio-first AI infrastructure grant. Backing OpenCrew’s voice and agent stack.
SecuredMarch 2026
Build in publicWhere we are.
Where we are.
Updated September 2026
We’re heads-down on v1. Waitlist is growing, ElevenLabs backed us, and we’re talking to a handful of pre-seed investors. If you’re reading this, that’s us being transparent about what’s real and what’s still ahead.
Live ledgerAs of September 2026
- Founders waiting
- 409
- Grants backer
- ElevenLabs
- Round open
- Pre-seed
- Building
- v1
Two views. Pick one.
The roundElevenLabs backed us first.
ElevenLabs backed us first.
Pre-seed is open.
Backed
Round status
Pre-seed
Open
Taking meetingsTarget raise
$1M
Pre-seed · open
RoadmapWhere we’ve been,
Where we’ve been,
where we are,
where we’re going.
6 of 12 shipped
September 2026
- Shipped 6
- In motion 2
- Ahead 4
- Late 2025Shipped
Bought opencrewai.com at 2am
Said “OK we’re doing this.” Plan: TBD.
- Jan 2026Shipped
First waitlist signup
Patient zero. A stranger from the internet said yes.
- Feb 2026Shipped
Brand identity locked
Theo. The orb. The green.
- Mar 2026Shipped
ElevenLabs Grant secured
They believed first.
- Apr 2026Shipped
300th founder on the waitlist
The thesis has weight.
- May 2026Shipped
V3 site shipped
You are reading it.
- You are hereSeptember 2026
- May 2026In motion
Pre-seed round open
In conversations.
- May 2026In motion
V1 product in active build
The autonomous business loop, end to end.
- Q3 2026Ahead
Closed beta
First 50 founders inside.
- Q4 2026Ahead
Public launch
Anyone can hire their AI co-founder.
- Q1 2027Ahead
First paying customers
Pricing live. Real money, real businesses.
- Q2 2027Ahead
First fully autonomous business
A real founder logs off. The business keeps running.
Why now“AI will run your business” was a slogan for a decade.
“AI will run your business” was a slogan for a decade.
Now it’s a buildable system.
Three things finally happened at the same time.
- 01
The AI got good enough to do the work, not just suggest it.
- 02
The tools fragmented into hundreds of agents that don’t coordinate.
- 03
A generation of founders showed up who’d rather build a system than manage a team.
OpenCrew is the layer that turns those pieces into one company.
The teamOne founder.
KartikIIT MadrasML at VisaCluely
One founder.
One AI co-founder.
01 · The founderSolo · since 2025
KartikIIT MadrasML at VisaCluely“I build systems that run without me.”
That’s how Kartik describes himself. IIT Madras Data Science, ML research at Visa and Cluely, and a small portfolio of businesses he already runs solo without a team. OpenCrew is the productization of how he already operates.
02 · AI co-founderOnline
Theo
The orb
Want the full picture?
Looking for a lead investor and advisor partners. Every conversation is real.
Founder’s logAn honest, weekly-ish note from the build.
An honest, weekly-ish note from the build.
What shipped, what’s hard, what’s next.
Entry 001
Welcome to the log
In short
Why we're going public with the build.
If you're reading this, you've found the part of OpenCrew that isn't a sales page.
I'm Kartik, the founder. There's no marketing team here. There's me, Theo, a Neon database, and 301 founders on a waitlist who said "yes, build this." That's where we are.
Why publish any of this? Because the founders I want to work with would rather read an honest log than a polished press release. Because writing it down forces me to be honest with myself about what's working, what's still broken, and what I'm still wrong about. And because the alternative is silence until launch day, and silence isn't a brand.
Cadence is roughly weekly, when something real has happened. No filler. No metrics-for-metrics-sake. The snapshot tiles at the top of this page are the dashboard. This is where the story lives.
End of entry 001, Kartik
Next entry incoming
New posts land here when something real has happened. Cadence: weekly-ish.
Talk to TheoReady to watch your business
Ready to watch your business
run itself?
Built for founders who would rather run the business than run the busywork.
- 01You get an inviteFounders join in small groups, in the order they signed up.
- 02Ten minutes with TheoTell him what you sell and who buys it. He drafts the plan.
- 03Live within the hourApprove it, and he builds the business and starts running it.
TheoHere now
Leave your email and I will save you a seat in the first group of founders.
409 founders on the waitlist