Dheeraj Pandey, CEO and co-founder of DevRev, can be the previous CEO and founding father of Nutanix and a present board member of Adobe. Together with co-founder Manoj Agarwal, Pandey launched DevRev to remodel how builders (Dev) join with revenue-generating clients (Rev).
DevRev’s mission is to embed customer-centricity into the core of product growth, turning it right into a cultural basis reasonably than a departmental focus. By leveraging information, AI, and design, the platform empowers builders to immediately impression enterprise outcomes, streamline workflows, and speed up innovation. Backed by one of many largest seed fundings in Silicon Valley historical past, DevRev is redefining customer-focused product growth with its Product-Led Progress (PLG) mannequin.
What impressed you to discovered DevRev after your profitable tenure with Nutanix, and the way did your expertise there form the imaginative and prescient for DevRev?
Whereas constructing Nutanix through the period of Enterprise SaaS 1.0, I discovered that enterprise software program usually turns right into a maze of fragmented instruments, every tackling only a piece of a broader drawback. Many merchandise available in the market are actually simply options packaged as full options. This expertise fueled my want to construct a platform that might really unify and simplify advanced workflows, serving to companies deal with what actually issues: their clients. DevRev was born from this concept of doing fewer issues however doing them higher—integrating features seamlessly to construct extra customer-centric corporations.”
DevRev is described as being constructed “from a clean web page within the AI period.” Are you able to elaborate on what this implies, and why it was essential to start out recent reasonably than construct on present SaaS methods?
Beginning DevRev from scratch in at the moment’s AI-driven world allowed us to create a essentially completely different product with out legacy constraints. AI is present process what I prefer to name a ‘Goldilocks second’—a stability the place expertise, demand, and instruments like neural networks are good for transformation. Constructing from a clean web page meant we may leverage these advances to rethink what SaaS may very well be and place clients and merchandise on the heart reasonably than adapting previous methods to new calls for.
You might have emphasised making a customer-centric platform at DevRev. How do you make sure that AI-driven processes nonetheless preserve human wants on the forefront of operations?
Our strategy is to make AI an enabler, not a alternative. We prioritize interactions that align with actual buyer wants by integrating human insights into the guts of DevRev’s AI and data graph—a robust, unified system that ties collectively product, buyer, and operational information to offer wealthy context for AI interactions. This implies the AI can help groups by managing updates and simplifying processes, permitting corporations to deal with actual buyer wants. The result’s a platform that enhances human interactions by being collaborative and contextual, serving to corporations stay empathetic and responsive.
What have been the most important challenges you confronted through the early days of DevRev, particularly when it comes to integrating AI and creating the data graph that powers the platform?
One main problem was avoiding the pitfalls of conventional project-centric methods. We needed DevRev to be customer- and product-centric, which required a complete data graph from the beginning. Constructing this was advanced, nevertheless it was important to breaking down silos and integrating the whole lot from buyer suggestions to engineering workflows into one seamless interface.
DevRev is positioned as an AI-native platform. How do you see AI evolving inside the enterprise SaaS area, and what function does DevRev play in that transformation?
AI is the driving drive behind what we see as SaaS 2.0—transferring from static software program to an adaptive, agent-driven expertise. On this new mannequin, AI is not only a software however a foundational layer that learns and evolves alongside the enterprise. DevRev leverages agentic AI to create a seamless, steady studying surroundings, permitting corporations to shift their focus from operational mechanics to deep buyer engagement. Simply because the cloud redefined infrastructure, AI is reshaping SaaS, enabling platforms like DevRev to drive richer, extra responsive interactions throughout your complete enterprise.
How does DevRev’s data graph differentiate it from conventional SaaS options? What worth does it carry to companies utilizing your platform?
DevRev’s data graph is constructed to unify product and buyer information, making a dynamic, built-in view throughout departments. Not like conventional CRMs, which regularly emphasize gross sales transactions, our data graph captures the complete journey of a product and the client’s interplay with it. This implies companies can higher predict wants, resolve points sooner, and in the end create a product that’s repeatedly aligned with buyer calls for.
The brand new options in AgentOS, similar to no-code customized AI brokers and conversational search, intention to simplify work. Might you share particular examples of how these options have reworked operations to your purchasers?
With AgentOS, corporations are discovering they’ll streamline processes that after required a number of instruments. As an illustration, no-code brokers permit help groups to shortly construct workflows that reply to distinctive buyer wants with out heavy IT involvement. One consumer used conversational search to cut back their response time by 30%, empowering help groups to focus extra on buyer satisfaction than backend coordination.
With main backers like Mayfield and Khosla Ventures, what was your strategy to securing funding for DevRev, and the way did you pitch the worth of your AI-native platform to traders?
The pitch centered on a recent strategy to SaaS that might be purpose-built for the AI period. Traders acknowledged that the timing was proper—AI, cloud, and buyer expectations have all developed. They noticed DevRev as a platform that might combine these components right into a unified answer, making enterprise software program each extra clever and extra customer-centric.
DevRev is already seeing substantial time-saving impacts (e.g., lowering incident response occasions by 30%). What different areas of enterprise SaaS do you consider can profit most from AI-driven effectivity?
AI could make an impression throughout features, particularly in areas that contain high-volume buyer interactions, advanced engineering processes, and frequent updates. DevRev is actively creating options that transcend simply time financial savings—serving to corporations lower down on operational prices whereas reaching a extra agile, customer-driven strategy.
As DevRev continues to develop, how do you preserve the stability between fast scaling and staying true to your mission of constructing customer-centric corporations?
Staying customer-centric means repeatedly evolving with our purchasers and their wants. We’re centered on scalable, high-impact options reasonably than overwhelming customers with choices. Our crew is dedicated to balancing progress with the precept of ‘much less is healthier,’ guaranteeing that each characteristic we roll out enhances the client journey and aligns with DevRev’s core mission.
Thanks for the nice interview, readers who want to study extra ought to go to DevRev.
