We are excited to welcome Krishna Mehra to Elevation Capital as AI Partner, deepening our commitment to partnering with India's most ambitious SaaS and AI founders. We have had the privilege of backing exceptional founders building from India for global markets over the last 15 years, partnering with nearly 30 companies in the SaaS and AI space, with an especially accelerated pace in the last four years.

At Elevation, we are extremely bullish on Indian founders building category-defining AI companies for the world, and with Krishna leading our presence in Silicon Valley, we are better positioned than ever to help founders realize this opportunity.

Krishna will be based in the San Francisco Bay Area, strengthening our presence in the world's most vibrant tech ecosystem. This is particularly crucial for our founders building in SaaS and AI as they increasingly look to serve global markets from day one. His addition deepens our commitment to the India-US corridor - not just supporting Indian founders building for global markets but also engaging with Indian diaspora founders who are leveraging talent and innovation across both ecosystems. Having built and scaled companies across continents himself, Krishna brings a special perspective on navigating this increasingly important bridge between Silicon Valley and India's tech hubs.

Krishna’s trifecta of experiences as a founder, operator, and investor par excellence makes him an invaluable addition to our partnership and, more importantly, a tremendous resource for founders we partner with. Excelling in even one of these areas is rare, but Krishna’s proven track record of extraordinary success across all three truly sets him apart.

From Building Giants to Backing Visionaries

Krishna’s journey as a founder began in 2008 when he co-founded Capillary Technologies, pioneering SaaS in India when the concept was still nascent. Today, Capillary is a global leader in loyalty solutions, exemplifying the "build in India, sell globally" model. As CTO, he scaled the company from its first line of code to serving 300 million consumers and 300 brands across 25,000 locations while raising $100M in venture funding and building a 120+ strong product and engineering team. In 2015, Krishna founded Taro, reimagining meal delivery with an innovative marketplace model. As CEO, he scaled Taro to over a million meals delivered across eight U.S. states, achieving multi-million-dollar revenue before a successful acquisition by EAT Club. Having built and scaled two ventures, Krishna intimately understands the full arc of the founder's journey. His success as a two-time founder demonstrates not just his ability to spot opportunities but to repeatedly execute and deliver outcomes that matter.

At Meta, Krishna led engineering for messaging ads, driving $10B+ in revenue with AI-driven products and deploying some of the world’s largest machine-learning models, including early adoption of Meta’s Llama. Prior to Meta, he architected enterprise-grade, exabyte-scale cloud systems at Cohesity. His leadership experience spans cross-continental teams, complex problem-solving, and scaling platforms that serve hundreds of millions of users and global enterprises. His dual experience in building early-stage products and scaling mature platforms gives him unparalleled insight into the end-to-end company-building journey.

Based in the Bay Area, Krishna is also a prolific angel investor with over 45 startups in his portfolio, including Innovaccer, MoEngage, and AppZen, which collectively created $5B+ in enterprise value. His investments focus on vertical SaaS, AI, and developer tools—areas where Indian founders are excelling globally. Known for his hands-on approach, Krishna leverages his operational expertise to guide startups through early-stage challenges and scale successfully.

Building for the Audacious

Krishna has walked the path our founders are on today. He deeply understands and respects the highs and lows of their journey. More than just expertise, Krishna brings the battle scars and wisdom gained from living every aspect of the company-building journey. He regularly shares his insights on entrepreneurship, leadership, and technology through his Substack blog (Day Zero), contributing to the broader ecosystem.

We are excited about what Krishna's addition means for our founders building in SaaS and AI. His unique combination of founder empathy, operator excellence, and investment acumen exemplifies what we mean when we say we are 'Built for the Audacious'. For founders taking on audacious challenges in SaaS and AI, Krishna’s addition strengthens our ability to be the most supportive partner from Day One through every stage of their journey.

Krishna graduated from IIT Kharagpur with a B.Tech degree in Computer Science and is the co-author of over ten international papers and patents in the areas of software engineering and cloud computing.