IIT Delhi graduates raise $1 million for ByteAsk

### IIT Delhi Graduates Raise $1 Million for AI Coding Startup ByteAsk

Two IIT Delhi graduates have raised $1 million in pre-seed funding for ByteAsk, an artificial intelligence startup developing a coding agent specifically designed for software engineers working with C and C++.

Anirudha Kulkarni and Pratyush Saini launched ByteAsk in June 2026, following the acquisition of their previous startup, LawSutra AI. The earlier venture developed an AI-powered legal research platform that was acquired by Manupatra earlier this year.

According to KaroStartup, LawSutra AI attracted more than 5,000 lawyers within four months of its launch before being acquired. The founders have now shifted from legal technology to software development, focusing on programming languages that remain important in areas such as automotive systems, semiconductor engineering, trading infrastructure and operating systems.

ByteAsk has been selected for Y Combinator’s Fall 2026 batch. Y Combinator lists the San Francisco-based company as an active startup, with Kulkarni serving as co-founder and CEO and Saini as co-founder and CTO.

The $1 million pre-seed round was led by Y Combinator, with participation from Entrepreneur First and angel investors, according to KaroStartup. ByteAsk plans to use the capital to expand its teams in San Francisco and Bengaluru, increase access to GPU computing and training data, and develop security and on-premise infrastructure for enterprise customers.

The startup is positioning itself differently from general-purpose AI coding assistants by placing the compiler, debugger and testing environment directly within the AI-assisted development workflow.

ByteAsk’s agent can modify source code, compile programs, execute tests and use debugging and sanitization tools before presenting changes to developers for review. The company says its platform supports widely used C and C++ development tools, including GCC, LLVM, Clang, CMake, gdb, Valgrind and several sanitizers.

The platform is also designed to work with multiple AI models. Developers can use models from companies such as OpenAI, Anthropic and Google, while also bringing their own API credentials or connecting self-hosted models through platforms including vLLM and Ollama.

The founders say the emphasis on compilation, testing and debugging is particularly important for software where reliability and correctness are critical. Rather than simply generating code, ByteAsk is designed to provide developers with the evidence produced by compilers, tests, debuggers and sanitizers so they can evaluate AI-generated changes.

The company’s approach reflects a broader shift in AI-assisted software development. Coding tools are increasingly moving beyond simple code generation toward systems that can execute programs, identify problems, test proposed fixes and iterate on changes with less manual intervention.

Kulkarni and Saini bring backgrounds in systems engineering, quantitative technology and AI development. According to ByteAsk, Kulkarni previously worked at Optiver and Quantbox, while Saini was a founding engineer at AI security company Simbian and previously worked at ThirdAI.

Both founders studied computer science at IIT Delhi, giving the company a technical foundation closely aligned with its focus on lower-level programming and systems software.

ByteAsk is targeting enterprise applications where C and C++ remain widely used, including defense, aerospace, robotics, automotive technology and semiconductor development. The company is building its workforce across San Francisco and Bengaluru as it develops its product for those markets.

The startup’s launch also marks a rapid transition for its founders, who moved from an AI legal research company to an AI software engineering venture within the same year. With its Y Combinator backing and new pre-seed funding, ByteAsk is now seeking to establish a specialized position in the increasingly competitive market for AI-powered coding tools.