Ola Krutrim, the artificial intelligence startup co-founded by Bhavish Aggarwal of Ola Electric, has reportedly laid off around 100 employees in a fresh round of downsizing. Most of those affected were part of the linguistics division, which focused on developing multilingual capabilities across Indian languages.
This is the second round of layoffs for the company, following a smaller reduction in workforce in June 2025. The move is being viewed as part of an internal restructuring aimed at creating a leaner and more agile team. It comes just weeks after the launch of Kruti, Krutrim’s AI assistant, designed with voice-first interaction to cater to the Indian market.
The layoffs have hit linguists working across ten regional languages. The development raises concerns about the sustainability of large-scale language model ambitions in a competitive and capital-intensive AI landscape. Several of the affected employees had recently relocated to Bengaluru as part of Krutrim’s expansion efforts.
Reports suggest the decision was driven by two key challenges—delays in securing fresh investment and a slower-than-expected user response to the product. Despite earlier momentum that saw Krutrim become a unicorn in 2024 following a $50 million investment from Z47 Partners, funding efforts appear to have stalled. The company had set a target of raising $1.15 billion by 2026 and had committed to investing $230 million this year alone.
Krutrim is attempting to carve out a distinct identity in India’s growing AI ecosystem. To support its vision, the company has also created BharatBench, an evaluation tool aimed at testing AI models across Indian languages.
