Zero Shot

HCL invests in Sarvam and goes down the 5-layer AI cake

For decades, Indian IT grew and grew some more based on the labor arbitrage model: deploy engineers from Bangalore at one-sixth the cost of an American engineer, bill, repeat. The industry perfected the art of selling "services" instead of building and owning technology. But AI has quickly made the engineer a commodity. The big question now is how IT services will pivot and reinvent. A step in that direction was seen recently, when news spread that HCLTech looks all set to invest $150M into Sarvam and lead its latest funding round.  But what exactly is HCL buying and what is Sarvam selling? That's the crux of this episode of Zero Shot. Host Rohin Dharmakumar is joined by Abhishek Pathak, the lead IT analyst at Motilal Oswal and Kashyap Kompella, the founder of RPA2AI Research, who has spent 25 years across AI strategy, M&A advisory, and industry analysis. While both agree the investment signals a shift from applications, they debate the core tensions and questions surrounding this deal.  Tune in and hear them unpack the move that could define the shape IT services will take going forward.  ____ Additional material:  https://x.com/nathanclark_/status/2056947354654355849?s=20 [https://x.com/nathanclark_/status/2056947354654355849?s=20] https://the-ken.com/story/google-meta-are-building-huge-data-centres-in-vizag-nobody-told-the-power-grid [https://the-ken.com/story/google-meta-are-building-huge-data-centres-in-vizag-nobody-told-the-power-grid] https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/business/startup/hcltech-to-lead-300-million-sarvam-ai-round-with-150-million-bet-at-1-5-billion-valuation-13918719.html [https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/business/startup/hcltech-to-lead-300-million-sarvam-ai-round-with-150-million-bet-at-1-5-billion-valuation-13918719.html] https://rpa2ai.com/about/team/ [https://rpa2ai.com/about/team/] https://www.linkedin.com/in/abhishek-pathak-841a3494 [https://www.linkedin.com/in/abhishek-pathak-841a3494/] https://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/ai-5-layer-cake/ [https://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/ai-5-layer-cake/] ____ This episode was produced by Vidhatri Rao and edited by Rajiv CN. ____ Zeus, the mascot of Zero Shot, was generated using AI. Everything else is made by humans, just like all articles, columns, newsletters, and other podcasts created by The Ken. Write to us at Zeroshot@the-ken.com. We are all ears!

'The application layer is dead': SpotDraft's Shashank Bijapur on why System of Record is the real moat

Another day and another Anthropic announcement has spurred conversation.  This time, it is Claude for Legal services. On May 12, Anthropic unveiled 20+ new "MCP connectors that link Claude to the software the legal industry runs on". Think Westlaw, LexisNexis, DocuSign. Alongside this, it announced 12 "new plugins tailored to specific legal work".  With every new Anthropic announcement, we typically ask two questions on Zero Shot. Are actual workflows impacted? And what does this do to companies building in similar spaces? In our latest episode, we sat down with Shashank Bijapur, the co-founder and CEO of SpotDraft, to find out more. SpotDraft works on contracts, a crucial component of a lawyer's workflow that Anthropic wants to augment. But Shashank is not worried.  He calls Claude the UPI layer. What you build on top of it is "heavily defensible," he adds.  But what exactly is SpotDraft building that enables it to work with Claude as opposed to being pressured by its entry into the legal tech stack?  Tune in! ____ Additional material:  An AI System Built by Litigators, for Litigators https://law-disrupted.fm/ai-system-built-by-litigators/ [https://law-disrupted.fm/ai-system-built-by-litigators/] Claude for the legal industry https://claude.com/blog/claude-for-the-legal-industry [https://claude.com/blog/claude-for-the-legal-industry] Mike OSS https://mikeoss.com/ [https://mikeoss.com/] ____ This episode was produced by Vidhatri Rao and edited by Rajiv CN. ____ Zeus, the mascot of Zero Shot, was generated using AI. Everything else is made by humans, just like all articles, columns, newsletters, and other podcasts created by The Ken. Write to us at Zeroshot@the-ken.com. We are all ears!

Anthropic's agents are your new finance professionals. They don’t offer investment advice

On May 5, Anthropic released 10 financial services agents. The company said they "pair best" with Claude Opus 4.7, a "state-of-the-art" model that leads the industry on financial agent benchmarks. And the hype followed. The media called the agents a threat to Wall Street.  The reality is more complicated. In today’s episode of Zero Shot, hosts Brady Ng and Praveen Gopal Krishnan are joined by Musheer Ahmed, founder of FinStep Asia and ex-trader, and Sharath Chandra, founder of EmpowerEdge Ventures, to make sense of what actually changed. The conversation covers why financial services keeps attracting AI investment, why the 10 agents are more useful to junior analysts than to the industry at large, and why trust remains the real bottleneck in finance. They also get into data residency, the regulatory moat protecting incumbent banks, and what happens to a service like the Bloomberg terminal. Tune in! ____ This episode was produced by Vidhatri Rao and edited by Rajiv CN. ____ Zeus, the mascot of Zero Shot, was generated using AI. Everything else is made by humans, just like all articles, columns, newsletters, and other podcasts created by The Ken. Write to us at Zeroshot@the-ken.com. We are all ears! ____ Additional Resources Who watches the AI watching your money? https://the-ken.com/kaching/who-watches-the-ai-watching-your-money/ [https://the-ken.com/kaching/who-watches-the-ai-watching-your-money/] Anthropic releases new AI agents for financial services firms https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/anthropic-releases-new-ai-agents-for-financial-services-firms-e2829b37 [https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/anthropic-releases-new-ai-agents-for-financial-services-firms-e2829b37] Anthropic unveils AI agents for financial services tasks https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3RLgeUiUXY [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3RLgeUiUXY] AI for financial services https://www.anthropic.com/news/finance-agents [https://www.anthropic.com/news/finance-agents]

Taking aim for 2026

It’s the end of 2025, so we don’t have a full episode of Zero Shot for you today. This podcast launched in September, and we’ve produced 14 episodes for you so far. We’ve covered a wide range of topics, and our conversations—between Praveen, Rohin, and Brady—only work because you’re willing to sit with the complexities we wade into.  We know artificial intelligence will move fast in 2026, so we’ll keep asking the questions that matter in this AI hype cycle. We’re glad you’re coming along with us. So, thank you, and we’ll be back next week. As always, if you’d like to get in touch with any or all of our hosts, please drop us a note at zeroshot@the-ken.com [zeroshot@the-ken.com]. We respond to all messages. The cover art of Zero Shot is generated by AI. Everything else is made by humans, just like all articles, columns, newsletters, and other podcasts created by The Ken.

Introducing Zero Shot

Join Brady Ng, Praveen Gopal Krishnan, and Rohin Dharmakumar of The Ken as they discuss the big ideas in artificial intelligence. You’ll get the macro view, explore their experiments in practical applications, go deeper than the news coverage you’ve seen, and hear about the implications of the latest developments. Nothing is off the table.