Is your classmate your next boss? How campus startups are hiring

On a typical day at an IIT, students are busy juggling lectures, assignments, coding projects and placement preparation. But for Arjun Sharma, a third-year student at an IIT, the biggest challenge is no longer just acing exams or landing a high-paying job. It is keeping a business running, and finding enough people to help build it.What began as an idea to develop an AI-powered tool for small businesses has grown into a start-up that now employs five people, including fellow students who might otherwise be competing for the same campus placements. “I started working on the idea because I kept seeing how small businesses struggled with tasks that could easily be automated. Initially, I thought I could build the product on my own, but as more customers came on board, I realised I needed a team. Hiring people I already knew made sense because they understood the idea and were willing to take a chance on it,” says Sharma.For the students working with him, the arrangement offers something beyond a certificate or a summer internship. It offers them a chance to earn, work on real projects and see what it takes to build a business from the inside.“It's quite different from a regular internship. You're not just completing tasks assigned to you, but you are helping build something from scratch. You have a say in decisions, and you can actually see the impact of your work,” says Rohan Mehta, a fellow student who joined the start-up in 2025 as a software developer. Their boss is not a visiting recruiter or a corporate executive flown in for a placement talk. It is someone they might share a classroom, a hostel corridor or a cup of chai with.A NEW CAMPUS OFFERING A NEW PERSPECTIVEThis is already happening across Indian campuses. Some students are building businesses while completing their degrees, while others are turning an online following, a technical skill or a simple idea into a source of income. But can these student-led ventures do more than help their founders earn a living? Can they become a meaningful source of employment in a country where millions of young people enter the job market every year?The GUESSS India 2025 National Survey Report, based on responses from 25,783 students, offers a glimpse of both the promise and the limits of student entrepreneurship.The report found that 50.7 per cent of students who wanted to start a venture had taken the step of starting one. Of those who had started, 35.5 per cent had reached the stage of regular sales.In total, 5,626 students, 21.8 per cent of the respondents, were classified as student entrepreneurs. This included 3,627 nascent founders trying to start a venture and 1,999 active founders whose businesses had regular sales. The figures show how the number of students who actually build and earn from a business falls as they move from intention to action. (Photo: GUESSS India Survey 2025) The report found that student-run businesses with regular sales in India had a median of five full-time employees, compared with two globally.That is a great figure, but it does not automatically mean student start-ups can solve India’s employment challenge. How many of these jobs will last, what kind of work do they offer, and can such businesses grow beyond a small team?FROM A STUDENT PROJECT TO SOMEONE ELSE’S PAYCHEQUEFor Dr Puran Singh, Associate Professor at the School of Management at IIT Mandi and part of the GUESSS India research team, student entrepreneurship does not always begin with a formal business plan or a big investment.Sometimes, it starts with a skill that other people are willing to pay for.Singh recalls a student in the third year of IIT Mandi’s five-year integrated MBA programme who began mentoring people seeking guidance on admission and preparation. The student earned around Rs 1 lakh and involved three classmates in the work. Later, he handed the venture over to a junior and moved on to another idea related to sports.Such ventures may not look like conventional companies. They might have no formal office, fixed hierarchy or standard corporate salary structure. Friends and classmates may share the work and divide the earnings.“There is no offer letter, not like a CTC. These are friends who run it and make money and distribute it amongst themselves,” Singh says.A student business can create paid work without immediately becoming a formal employer. Some ventures remain small or short-lived; others develop into businesses that hire people beyond the founder’s circle.Singh believes the collective effect deserves attention. “Maybe one venture cannot create stable jobs, but many ventures can collectively be job creators,” he says. Student businesses are growing at a pace, as per the survey WHEN A STUDENT BUSINESS STARTS HIRINGKalpit Veerwal topped JEE Main in 2017 with a perfect score of 360 out of 360. As students began asking him about exam preparation, he started sharing guidance online. The effort grew into AcadBoost Technologies Pvt. Ltd., an education venture he worked on before its formal incorporation.“My reason for starting posting online was mainly to answer these questions en masse,” Veerwal says. “That I can address all of them.”As the platform developed, the work expanded beyond one person. Veerwal estimates that he hired around five to 10 people for software development and, at one stage, up to 50 people to create educational content in physics, chemistry and mathematics, from Class 9 to college level. Some worked as freelancers and others full-time.But his hiring needs did not keep rising with the business.“Much of my platform was already built at that time,” he says. Once a website or app is ready, he explains, it mainly needs maintenance. Educational content also does not need to be recreated from scratch every time. His decision not to offer live classes was another factor: running live sessions would require people to teach on a regular, full-time basis.Then came AI.“The hiring part, I would say it has declined, at least on my end,” Veerwal says, adding that he has noticed a similar trend among some other start-ups he knows, particularly in his niche.He describes how work that once required separate people to prepare questions, notes and theory can now be done with AI tools. Coding, too, has changed: tools available today can help with tasks that previously required more manual work.His experience offers a useful perspective on how hiring has changed over the past few years. A student venture may need more people while building its product and creating its first batch of content, but fewer once the core work is complete. AI can further reduce the need for some tasks. That does not mean every start-up is hiring less; it shows that employment depends on the business model, its stage of growth and the kind of work it needs.Veerwal says he has often hired people who approached him through his online audience, including people with subject knowledge but fewer opportunities elsewhere. He also draws on alumni, friends and other networks rather than relying on one hiring channel.Currently, Veerwal has 25–30 people working with him. "I must have created 150 to 200 jobs till now," he says. AI is also changing the nature of these startups being built AI START-UPS AND THE JOBS THEY MAY CREATEThe changing nature of work is also shaping student-led ventures. Alok Raj, an IIT Bombay student and part of Fastoprox, says the start-up builds AI agents for repetitive tasks, from updating spreadsheets to preparing reports.“Our ambition is not to replace people, but to help businesses delegate suitable repetitive tasks to AI workers,” he says.Fastoprox has a team of around 10–15 people across technology, product development, implementation and business development. The self-funded venture earns revenue through software and voice services. For future hiring, Raj says the focus will be on finding people who can build reliable solutions and meet customer needs.“Building a prototype is one thing. Building a solution that works consistently with real business data, existing software, changing requirements, and unexpected situations is very different,” he says.Raj says hiring must match the work the business can reliably deliver — and the revenue it can sustain. “We do not want to hire based on optimistic revenue projections and then struggle to meet our commitments,” he says. Can student ventures really create stable jobs in India? CAN THESE VENTURES CLOSE THE EMPLOYABILITY GAP?For Ankur Agrawal, founder and CEO of LHR Group, student start-ups could help address a problem that goes beyond the number of vacancies: whether young people are prepared for the work employers need done.“India’s problem is not just an employment gap but an employability gap,” he says. “Many jobs never get created because businesses don’t trust freshers to get work done.”He says student start-ups can offer roles in sales, social media, customer support, operations, content and early product development. Working closely with a founder may also give students more responsibility than they would get in some entry-level roles.Agrawal says the value can lie in giving a fresher responsibility early. “In my experience, a year of real ownership at a startup can be worth more than two years of narrow work, but the person must have actually done the work and documented it.”A student working in a small team may have to meet deadlines, follow up with customers and take responsibility for an outcome rather than wait for instructions. That experience can be useful when applying for a job later, if the work is real and the person can explain what they did.Agrawal believes this matters because businesses can be reluctant to hire fresh graduates who need significant training. But he warns that a student start-up is not automatically a good workplace. Founders may still be learning to manage people; salaries can be irregular, training may be limited and the venture could shut when the founder graduates or takes another opportunity.He advises candidates to ask how long the business can sustain itself, whether there is a written offer specifying the salary and payment date, and what the founder plans to do after graduation.THE NUMBERS BEHIND THE OPPORTUNITY — AND THE RISKThe GUESSS report shows that many student businesses are still young. Nearly one in three active student businesses — 31 per cent, was founded in 2025, compared with 18 per cent globally. Four in ten active student founders had already closed an earlier business, while 42 per cent of Indian student founders reported running two or more businesses, compared with 25 per cent globally. (Photo: GUESSS India Survey 2025) A student may shut one venture and try another; a business may change direction before finding customers. That is part of entrepreneurship, but it also means that not every job created by a student venture will last.Formalisation is another challenge. The report found that 58 per cent of active student businesses were formally registered, against a global average of 65 per cent. Just over half, 52 per cent, had been started without a co-founder.The sectors students want to enter also differ from the sectors in which businesses are already running. IT, AI and digital ventures accounted for 23.7 per cent of planned businesses, but 9.5 per cent of running businesses. Manufacturing, agriculture and fisheries had a stronger presence among running ventures. The gap suggests that an idea that sounds promising is not always the easiest one to turn into a business with paying customers. (Photo: GUESSS India Survey 2025) The risks are real even for founders who have made their first sales. Among active founders surveyed, 58 per cent worried that no one would want their product, 57 per cent were concerned about running out of money and 55 per cent worried about managing people. Hiring, therefore, is only one part of the challenge; keeping the business alive is another.For Singh, the solution is not to expect every student venture to become a large company. Some students may experiment, move into a job or hand a business over to a junior. Others may grow into employers. Support from universities, mentors and incubators can help students take the next step, but the venture must ultimately solve a problem people will pay to address.The survey also found that students who had taken a dedicated entrepreneurship programme were more likely to have started a business than those who had not: 66 per cent against 39 per cent. That does not guarantee success, but it suggests that practical support can help students move beyond the idea stage. (Photo: GUESSS India Survey 2025) Agrawal says, "While a typical student startup with five full-time employees is not going to move national numbers on its own, thousands of them hiring their first five people add up."Veerwal argues that these businesses can create work for their founders as well as for classmates, juniors and other people who join them. His own experience shows how hiring can extend beyond the founder’s immediate college circle, including through online networks and professional connections.Singh, meanwhile, points out that student ventures can take different paths. Some are temporary experiments that give way to another idea or a conventional job. Others can grow into more established businesses. Not every founder needs to build a large company for the experience to be useful, but the jobs created by small ventures may be less stable than those offered by mature employers.For student start-ups to become a reliable source of employment, they will need more than enthusiasm. They must build products people want, bring in repeat customers, pay people on time and plan for what happens when the founder leaves college.Student entrepreneurs are already creating opportunities, sometimes for themselves and sometimes for others. The survey suggests that this is more than a handful of campus success stories. But whether it becomes a major employment generator will depend on how many ventures move beyond the early stages, and how many can turn short-term opportunities into lasting work.- Ends