In an exclusive conversation with Indian Startup Times, Avinash V Singh shared his remarkable entrepreneurial journey filled with resilience, experimentation, failures, and reinvention. From starting his first business during Class 12 in Ranchi to building an AI-powered hiring platform designed for the future of work, Avinash’s story reflects the evolving landscape of entrepreneurship and recruitment in India.
Early Entrepreneurial Beginnings
Avinash’s entrepreneurial mindset began at a very young age. During his school years in Ranchi, he identified an opportunity when Reliance Infrastructure Associates Limited was setting up telecom operations in the late 1990s — what would later evolve into Reliance Communications and eventually Jio.
At a time when structured vehicle rental services were scarce in smaller cities, Avinash stepped in to provide transportation solutions for the company. The venture became a successful early business experience for him. However, coming from a service-class family, the traditional path of higher education and corporate employment eventually took priority.
After completing his MBA, Avinash entered the corporate world through campus placements but soon realized conventional jobs did not align with his ambitions. He left his first job within six months and co-founded a telecom infrastructure company with his college roommate. While the venture showed promise, the capital-intensive nature of the business forced him back into employment.
Over the next several years, he worked across global markets selling complex telecom software solutions, gaining deep exposure to international business operations, technology ecosystems, and enterprise growth strategies.
The Mealhopper Phase and Entrepreneurial Persistence
In 2014, Avinash returned to entrepreneurship by launching Mealhopper, a food aggregation startup based in Gurgaon. The startup received backing from notable founders & Angel investors. Despite strong efforts, the venture did not scale as expected.
Rather than viewing setbacks as failures, Avinash considered them learning experiences that shaped his understanding of business realities, scalability challenges, and market behavior.
“This has probably been the fifth or sixth venture I’ve worked on,” he shared during the interview, reflecting on a journey marked by continuous learning and resilience.
The Birth of Northstarz.Ai
The idea behind Northstarz.Ai emerged in November 2022 when Avinash joined hands with two long-time friends and industry experts:
- Saurabh Sisodia Singh, an engineering graduate from BIT Mesra with a master’s degree from BITS Pilani, who previously worked with major global technology companies including Amazon, Expedia, and Oracle.
- Rajiv Ranjan, a behavioral assessment and human resources specialist with extensive international experience across Poland, Malaysia, Philippine, and the HSBC and IndusInd Bank
Together, the trio identified a major flaw in India’s hiring ecosystem.
According to Avinash, recruitment processes in India had become excessively focused on technical qualifications while overlooking critical human-centric capabilities such as:
- Problem-solving
- Communication skills
- Critical thinking
- Adaptability
- Leadership and articulation
The founders strongly believed that the rise of artificial intelligence would eventually reduce the importance of purely technical tasks while increasing demand for individuals who could collaborate, communicate, and leverage AI effectively.
From InterviewVision to Northstarz.Ai
The founders initially launched a platform called InterviewVision, aimed at helping college students assess and improve soft skills through AI-driven video interviews.
The platform enabled students to:
- Take free AI-based interviews
- Receive instant behavioral analysis reports
- Understand their communication and problem-solving strengths
- Access learning resources to improve employability
However, despite extensive outreach to colleges and universities, adoption remained limited. Students and institutions showed little urgency toward structured soft-skill development.
This challenge pushed the founders to rethink their strategy.
Instead of focusing on candidates, they shifted their technology toward recruiters and enterprises — ultimately leading to the creation of Northstarz.Ai.
Solving Recruitment Inefficiencies with AI
Northstarz.Ai was built to address a critical problem in modern hiring: recruiters often struggle to efficiently identify top candidates from massive application pools.
Avinash explained that traditional hiring workflows involve:
- Reviewing hundreds or thousands of resumes
- Spending hours on initial screening calls
- Shortlisting candidates manually
- Facing high rejection rates from hiring managers
The founders realized that recruiters are typically not trained behavioral analysts or technical evaluators. As a result, companies often spend enormous amounts of time and resources on inefficient hiring cycles.
To solve this, Northstarz.Ai introduced a fully agentic AI recruitment platform powered by:
- Proprietary behavioral assessment models
- Advanced AI systems including Gemini integration
- Multiple AI agents handling candidate screening and analysis
The platform evaluates both behavioral and technical capabilities, enabling companies to identify stronger candidates faster and more accurately.
The Meaning Behind “Northstarz”
Speaking about the brand identity, Avinash shared that the name “Northstarz” was inspired by the North Star — the one celestial object that remains constant while other stars shift positions.
For the company, the North Star symbolizes:
- Clarity of direction
- Consistency
- Focus on long-term goals
- Identifying exceptional talent
The startup’s mission is to help organizations discover their “North Star candidates” — individuals capable of delivering consistent performance, adaptability, and leadership in an AI-driven future.
Building Trust in an Emerging AI Market
Launching an AI-powered hiring platform in 2023 came with its own challenges. At the time, artificial intelligence was still largely viewed as a buzzword by enterprises, even though individual users had begun experimenting with AI tools.
Avinash revealed that Northstarz.Ai had to conduct more than 200 pilot programs to build confidence among organizations and demonstrate the platform’s effectiveness.
He believes that while 2023–2025 represented the experimentation phase for AI adoption, the coming years will witness large-scale enterprise implementation of AI across core business functions, including recruitment and talent management.
Vision for the Future
Northstarz.Ai represents more than just recruitment automation. The founders envision a future where hiring decisions are driven by a balanced understanding of both technical expertise and deeply human capabilities.
As AI reshapes industries globally, the startup aims to position itself at the intersection of behavioral intelligence, hiring automation, and workforce transformation.
With growing enterprise interest in AI-powered talent solutions, Northstarz.Ai is building toward a future where companies can hire not just skilled employees — but adaptable, future-ready individuals capable of thriving alongside artificial intelligence.
Interview Conducted By: Arushi Agarwal
