A missed 7 PM customer call cost an HVAC company a $45,000 job, exposing the problem Cactus is building AI to solve.
Ajith Govind and Avinash Joshi are the co-founders of Cactus, an AI-powered office for trades businesses. Previously, they helped build Turing Labs, an AI platform for consumer packaged goods product development that raised $20 million. After going through Y Combinator, they reunited to build their next company, transforming an initial private-chef marketplace into an AI operating platform for HVAC, plumbing, and other trades businesses.
In this episode of the Ignite Podcast, host Brian Bell explores why Ajith and Avinash believe voice AI has already become a commodity and why the real opportunity lies in owning the entire customer experience. Cactus started by answering missed calls for $500 per month but expanded into booking jobs, scheduling dispatch, managing customer communications, and developing a broader AI-powered business operating system. The founders describe seeing reports suggesting their technology impacted $500,000 in customer revenue in a single month.
Their most controversial decision was refusing to integrate with ServiceTitan, despite the potential for rapid customer acquisition. They argue that depending on an established platform can limit a startup's ability to own its customer relationships and build a competing operating system. Instead, Cactus is pursuing the harder path of developing an independent platform for trades businesses generating approximately $2 million to $25 million annually.
In Today’s Episode We Discuss
- 00:00Introduction to Ajith Govind, Avinash Joshi, and Cactus
- 00:48How the co-founders met and started building together
- 04:09Why Y Combinator is worth doing twice
- 06:39Lessons from Turing Labs and raising $20 million
- 09:00Why co-founder values matter more than the initial idea
- 13:47The challenges of Turing Labs
- 15:06How a Legoland visit inspired their first marketplace
- 18:38From Craved to Cactus and the second YC journey
- 22:42The $45,000 missed-call problem in HVAC
- 25:04How Cactus drives revenue for trades businesses
- 27:11Building an AI office beyond voice automation
- 30:02Why Cactus refused to integrate with ServiceTitan
- 34:48Why voice AI is becoming a commodity
- 37:27The future of AI, robotics, and trades businesses
- 42:15Why AI is changing traditional product development
- 44:43Why paying customers matter more than vanity metrics
- 45:54Where to find Cactus
The next generation of business software may be defined less by what technology can automate than by how much independence it gives the people running the business.
Pull Quotes
"Voice AI is right now a commodity."
"Nothing else matters other than are they actually paying for it?"
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