Whenever Nikhil Kamath puts out a LinkedIn post, it is not unusual for business newsrooms to scramble and race towards putting out a fresh news story on it. His views on markets, startups or the economy are routinely picked up by media houses and debated across social platforms. That reflexive attention says less about celebrity and more about the kind of brand Kamath has become. Data from the Avendus Wealth–Hurun India U40 List 2025 shows that these founders have become the marketing channel for their brands.
The report further shows that a growing number of India’s youngest business titans are building category-leading companies alongside powerful personal brands, using social media as a primary engine of consumer trust and growth.
The founder as a distribution channel
Nikhil Kamath, co-founder of Zerodha, tops Hurun’s list of the “Most Followed Minds” with 1.39 million LinkedIn followers. On X (formerly Twitter), he has another 0.5 million followers, and on Instagram, he has 1.5 million followers.
Mamaearth co-founder Ghazal Alagh follows with 633,000 on LinkedIn, 698,000 on Instagram, and 63,500 on X. Ola Electric’s Bhavish Aggarwal has 324,000 followers on LinkedIn, 572,000 on X and 77,700 on Instagram.
Others in the top ten, as per the Hurun report, include Vivek Ravisankar of HackerRank, Puneet Gupta of Astrotalk, Prateek Maheshwari of Physics Wallah and Sagar Daryani of Wow! Momo, each with a follower base ranging from about 91,000 to 117,000.
In effect, for these founders, the social media channels have become a platform to announce product launches, frame business decisions, and social commentary, and build emotional resonance with customers.
Trust built on “Self-Made” stories
What makes this model particularly potent in India is the personal credibility behind it. According to Hurun’s data, 83% of the U40 cohort are first-generation founders who built their companies from scratch. Their biographies, often involving bootstrapping, early failures and long odds, are now embedded into the brands they run.
This matters in consumer-facing sectors. Ghazal Alagh’s public positioning as an advocate of ethical, toxin-free products directly reinforces Mamaearth’s brand promise. Prateek Maheshwari’s persona as a hands-on educator mirrors Physics Wallah’s low-cost, access-first edtech strategy.
The capital efficiency angle
As per the Hurun report, despite collectively leading enterprises valued at $357 billion, nearly one-eleventh of India’s GDP, U40-led companies allocate just 5% of their total funding to “Brand Marketing & Awareness”.
Instead, 29% of capital is channelled into product development and expansion, while 27% goes into market and geographical expansion. Another 10% is earmarked for R&D, 12% for channel and distribution growth, and 8% for talent acquisition, the report added.
When Kamath posts and the media follows, it is not just because he runs Zerodha. It is because he has become the brand. And in India’s startup economy, that may be the most valuable asset of all.