Indian man leaves Rs 1.9 crore Microsoft job, now earning Rs 5.4 lakh with his AI startup - India Today
Indian man leaves Rs 1.9 crore Microsoft job, now earning Rs 5.4 lakh with his AI startup - India Today
摘要: Indian man leaves Rs 1.9 crore Microsoft job, now earning Rs 5.4 lakh with his AI startup
Junead Khan quit his Microsoft job, which paid him more tha
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Indian man leaves Rs 1.9 crore Microsoft job, now earning Rs 5.4 lakh with his AI startup
Junead Khan quit his Microsoft job, which paid him more than Rs 1.9 crore annually, to build an AI startup without venture capital funding. His company, Treasury, has generated over Rs 5.4 lakh in revenue, but he is still living off his savings.
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Junead Khan left Microsoft after earning over $200,000 a year to build his AI-powered financial advice startup, Treasury. (Right image source: Reuters)
Ankita Garg
New Delhi
Oct 12, 2026 17:28 IST
Last Updated
Oct 12, 2026 17:28 IST
Published by
Ankita Garg
Oct 12, 2026 17:28 IST
Junead Khan had a six-figure salary, stock bonuses and a
at Microsoft that gave him a front-row seat to the artificial intelligence boom. Yet, after working at the tech giant for around two years, the 25-year-old decided to walk away from that financial security to build his own AI startup, according to Business Insider.
Khan, who is now based in Seattle, earned more than $200,000 (around Rs 1.9 crore) in 2024, including stocks and bonuses. His startup, Treasury, has generated more than $6,000 (around Rs 5.4 lakh) in revenue so far. However, he is not drawing a salary from the business and continues to live on the savings he accumulated while working at Microsoft.
Why he decided to leave Microsoft
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Khan joined Microsoft full-time in 2023 after graduating with a computer science degree from the University of North Carolina. His work involved supporting the rollout of data centres across the world, giving him valuable experience during a period of rapid AI growth.
Over time, however, he began to feel that the job was not helping him develop the AI skills he wanted to learn. Following service outages in early 2025, he noticed a greater focus on security and service stability, which he felt slowed down product development.
Meanwhile, AI coding tools were improving rapidly, making him