Former Infosys chief has a new startup that wants to challenge the IT services world

The Aramco Ventures co-investment is the detail worth sitting with: it signals Gulf sovereign capital is actively betting that AI will hollow out traditional IT services contracts, the kind of long-cycle, high-margin work that funds companies like Infosys and Wipro. Sikka is not just building a product company; he is building a services replacement thesis with patient, strategically motivated money behind it.

This is largely disconnected from recent activity in our archive, as we have no prior coverage to anchor it to. It belongs to a broader thread running through enterprise software coverage generally: the slow-motion pressure on legacy IT services firms as AI-assisted delivery compresses the labor arbitrage model those firms were built on. Sikka spent years inside that model at Infosys and left under contested circumstances, which gives his bet here a pointed quality that pure outsider ventures lack. The talent pull from SAP and VianAI suggests the startup is targeting the integration and consulting layer specifically, where margins are highest and automation exposure is most acute.

Watch whether Infosys, Wipro, or TCS responds within the next 12 months by acquiring an AI-native services firm rather than building internally. A defensive acquisition would confirm that incumbents see this model as a genuine threat rather than a niche experiment.