Emergent’s Vibe Coding Revolution: From Prompts to $100M ARR

A new chapter is unfolding in software development. At the India AI Impact Summit 2026, Mukund Jha, co-founder and CEO of Emergent, said that building software “will become super easy” in the near future — to the point where anyone can create complex applications by simply giving prompts. This shift reflects a broader trend where artificial intelligence is not just augmenting coding work but completely redefining how apps are built.

Emergent’s platform has gained explosive momentum. Just eight months after its launch, the startup announced it has crossed $100 million in annualised run rate (ARR) — nearly doubling that number in the last month alone — driven by demand for its “vibe coding” capabilities.

What Vibe Coding Means

Traditional software development has long required developers to write, debug, test, and deploy code manually. Emergent’s platform takes a different approach. Using natural language prompts — such as “build an app like Dunzo” — the system’s AI agents automatically generate UI, backend logic, databases, and infrastructure. It routes tasks to specialised modules, then merges outputs into production-ready applications without requiring users to write a single line of code.

This method, which Emergent and others refer to as vibe coding, lowers the barrier to building applications. The platform handles everything from design to deployment, claiming a 99% deployment success rate on live apps.

Rapid Growth and Market Demand

Emergent’s growth trajectory has been exceptional. According to founders, the platform has attracted millions of users globally and enabled rapid app building across diverse sectors. More than 50,000 active developers and teams use the product to build full-stack applications that run in production, driving viral growth through referrals and integrations.

The company’s revenue growth mirrors its adoption. Emerging from a freemium model that attracts solo builders and independent creators, paid conversions now exceed 25%, a strong performance indicator in a competitive space.

Emergent’s expansion has also been fuelled by investor confidence. In January 2026, the startup raised $70 million in a Series B round led by Khosla Ventures and SoftBank Vision Fund 2, giving it a $300 million valuation less than a year after launch. Other backers include Prosus, Lightspeed, Together Fund, and Y Combinator participants.

Platform Use and Community

Emergent’s platform serves more than 6 million users across 190 countries, including both technical and non-technical customers. Many users are small businesses, solopreneurs, and early-stage teams that previously lacked in-house development resources. By empowering them to build apps with simple prompts, the platform accelerates productivity and creativity.

The demand for this style of development reflects wider industry sentiment: software creation is evolving from a manual engineering task into a collaborative process between humans and AI. Rather than replacing teams, the platform enables teams to build projects ten times faster, from ideation to deployment, and reduces dependency on extensive coding expertise.

Competitive Landscape

Emergent competes with established platforms like Replit, Lovable, Cursor, and others in the emergent “AI coding” segment. These companies also use AI to streamline software development, but Emergent’s end-to-end approach — handling deployment, testing, hosting, and backend infrastructure — gives it a distinctive edge.

Industry valuations reflect the growing appetite for AI-assisted development. Competitors like Replit have achieved multibillion-dollar valuations, while Lovable and Cursor have also seen rapid investment and adoption.

Founder Vision: From Code to Prompt

Mukund Jha believes that the future of software development lies less in writing code and more in describing intent. At the India AI Impact Summit, he demonstrated how someone could “prompt” an application like Dunzo into existence using natural language. This approach shifts the emphasis away from syntax and tool fluency toward creativity, problem-solving, and overall design thinking — skills that are harder to automate.

What This Means for the Tech Industry

The rise of vibe coding has implications well beyond Emergent’s platform. As more tools enable non-technical users to build complex applications, traditional software engineering may evolve into a discipline that focuses on architecture, strategy, and integration rather than manual coding alone.

For businesses, this trend promises faster prototyping, lower development costs, and broader participation in software creation. For individual creators, it opens doors to innovate without needing deep technical skills.