Page 33 - DAIS - DAISPORA ISSUE04

DAISPORA Ira Gupta was cub captain of Tiger House when I was House captain, so I’ve been

lucky enough to spend a fair bit of time with her. Even at a very young age, she
VOICES was always an interesting and impressive figure – conversation with her made it
quickly evident that her sharp mind matched her tall stature.

Her path since leaving DAIS has been fairly unique – graduating from the
University of Pennsylvania in 2016, she started as a consultant on the Corporate
Consulting Arm of BNP Paribas. In 2018, she moved to Affirm (a leading BNPL -
buy now, pay later- player in the US), starting as a business analyst on the low
exposure products team, where she spent time analyzing the adoption and
efficacy of their product and giving key customers analytical reports on how to
improve performance and adoption. Ira joined when the term BNPL was just
about being coined, and jokes that every time she said she worked at Affirm,
she’d get asked “what firm?”.

Ira had a prolific career in the five years she spent at Affirm, working on Product
Strategy and eventually handling some of the largest special projects with clients
including Walmart and Amazon. She left Affirm in 2023, when she moved to India
after getting married.

In January 2024, Ira began a new role as Head of Partnerships and Growth at
Haptik, a conversational AI company founded in 2013, which pioneered chatbots
in India – Haptik also has a turnkey solution for WhatsApp that more than 25,000
businesses in India use to engage their customers. Ira believes that the work
being done at Haptik is indicative of how AI touches all our lives in some shape
or form – as she says, “we started in an era where websites were necessary for a
business, then came the apps, but India totally skipped that trend and the
hyper-penetration of Whatsapp has made it the user interface - replacing the
need for websites, apps, and with the infusion of AI, even humans!”

However, it is important to highlight that an AI-driven product is not a magic
potion for any company – “AI driven companies face the looming question of
AI is here to stay & success ROI. Businesses need to be hyper-precise when it comes to deploying AI and

using it to drive results.”
will come to those who Ira is clear that her career experience so far has reinforced her belief in the

power of AI to shape the success of individuals and organizations – “AI is here to
find a way to work with it. stay and success will come to those who find a way to work with it and mould it

to their needs instead of depending on it for miracles.”

Ira Gupta Ushma Ghatlia Marwah
Class of 2012 Class of 2008