Avinash Joshi

If you don't stop, you will win. Today, tomorrow, or some day. "Keep going!!" - one of my fav one liners from @julianweisser!! @avinashjoshi

“AI slop grenade. please do defer forever :D” @avinashjoshi's comment made my day. A teammate used Grokbot on a solid Basecamp doc (written by @pdx529). It basically rewrote the whole thing as an essay. we use AI everywhere. but dont save yourself 10 mins and create 1 hour of work for everyone else.

Before @avinashjoshi and I built an AI company, we took an actual boat from our hostel to computer science class in Kerala. 15+ years later, he’s my co-founder and guest #1 on Prickly on Purpose. We talked boats, code, product, and why he rejects my feature requests. 😂 youtube.com/watch?v=XD6gcJuI…

When I was a kid, I wanted to be a fighter pilot. This Wednesday, I'm stepping onto an aircraft carrier. USS Midway. San Diego. 500 business owners. Honestly just excited to be in a room full of the people we wake up every morning thinking about. If you're there - come say hi. 🌵 @avinashjoshi

Ryan flew from Salt Lake City to spend 3 days with us this week. During his busy season. If you knew how badly software vendors have burned these business owners, you'd understand why that matters. 6 months ago, when @avinashjoshi and I stumbled into this industry through a referral. We had no idea how fed up they were. Initially we thought it was just fatigue - busy people, overwhelmed, too many tools. But it's deeper than that. Software vendors have repeatedly taken advantage, locked them into contracts, and in some cases outright scammed them. These are people running real businesses. Trucks on the road. Families depending on them. And they've been treated like a number in accounting. Over the last 6 months, we now work with a rapidly growing customer base across 15 states. Not because of some "clever" partnership with existing software giants. Because we genuinely care about their businesses and treat their success like our success. And it shows in their growth!! Ryan sat with our engineering team. Gave product feedback in real time. Told us exactly what's working and what's not. Stayed until Thursday. No agenda. In his words "I want to be part of what you're building." We're not building a product people tolerate. We're building something people want to be part of. We are building for the business owners like Ryan who started from zero and built a real impactful local business which now supports 50+ families. That's our mission.

I'll be honest. We almost built the wrong company. @avinashjoshi and I made a decision early: we weren't going to be another SaaS tool that disappears after you sign up. We went ALL IN! We built text groups with our customers and replied at 1am. We listened to every after-hours call they received. We researched their competitors and figured out exactly why they were losing jobs. We treated their revenue like it was our own money on the line. The results? → Roofing company, NC. $299K collected in 10 weeks. → General contractor. 11 jobs/month to 72. One month. Zero new hires. → Plumbing & HVAC, UT. $180K confirmed in 4 months. Half from leads that would've hit voicemail. Today we launched our new website. Built for the people who show up every day with a truck, a team, and a whole lot of grit. @oncactusai 👉 cactus.ai

We are on the way to RoofCON, Oklahoma!! Starting 2026 with a BOOM. 2026 will be the best ever yet, I have no doubt :) @avinashjoshi @oncactusai @rubysmwang

Thankful for having a co-founder who has a win-win mentality and insatiable desire to win. Thankful you chose to go on this beautiful journey with me, it has made all the difference for me! @avinashjoshi!! I am thankful to my life partner, Prajakta, for supporting and believing in me during the darkest times. Everyone needs that one person who believes in them without doubt; without that, I wouldn’t have become an entrepreneur. I thank my just-turned 3-year-old, Anav, for showing me that anything is possible if we put our minds to it. You gave me more belief in myself. I thank my parents and Prajakta’s mom for their support and help. Thankful to our wonderful Cactus team who came in all inbound into this journey. It is magical. Thankful to our customers, without whom we wouldn’t be in business! Thank you for trusting us to solve your problems. Thanks to Tom and YC for giving me a second chance. It’s my mission to prove them right! I’m grateful for this opportunity and freedom to build something awesome that makes a positive impact. I remind myself that I’m living my childhood dream. Happy Thanksgiving to all from @oncactusai !!

"Let's cut scope, not quality" - @avinashjoshi :)

I've got over 500+ inbounds from people seeking roles. Not a single one of them is from Rails, which is what we are building Cactus on. Only reach out if 1. You are a top 1% rails engineer 2. In SF or ready to relocate (happy to sponsor visa) 3. Open to a fully paid trial

Today is DEMO DAY!!! When you find the CEO of @ycombinator personally making sure everything is perfect, you know you are in a very special place. Garry Tan gave a rousing speech to the batch and we are SO pumped. Already heard from so many investors that this batch is breaking records and making history. @avinashjoshi and I are grateful to @t_blom @koomen and @garrytan for being our partners and giving us this opportunity to build a truly generational company. GO YC X25!!!!