Araash Ahuja

I study finance, systems engineering, and music at Penn. I'm 20, and I love to play golf and squash, eat good food, and listen to rap, house, and jazz.

This past summer I was at ICONIQ, learning how great companies are built and how investors think about growth. Before that, I tinkered with startups, sneakers, and a few half-finished projects that taught me a ton.

Latest Writing

  • Issues with YC
    11/15/2025•1 min read

    I’ve been thinking a lot about how homogenized the global startup ecosystem has become. The accelerator model scaled the playbook for launching...

  • Open Source
    11/11/2025•2 mins read

    I read something recently that clarified a tension I have been thinking about in the AI ecosystem. Open source is likely to win the model layer, but...

  • As We Get Smarter
    10/16/2025•1 min read

    I was chatting with one of my friends recently. As we become more educated, our lessons/learnings seem very interestingly apparent to the average...

  • Thinking About Ego
    10/7/2025•2 mins read

    I would rather have more of an ego than less. I believe that if you apply ego the right way – in that it encourages you to back what you say (be more...

  • Taking Inspiration
    10/5/2025•1 min read

    I always notice that the exchange students at school are more engaged, on average. Perhaps a better framework for approaching school is to think like...

Reading

Check out the books I'm currently reading, have completed, or plan to read.

View my reading list →