Gaurav Bubna
Gaurav Bubna (born 1988), is an Indian tech executive and entrepreneur. He is the co-founder and Chief Product Officer of NextBillion.ai, a Singapore-based geospatial mapping and routing startup which was acquired by Velocitor Solutions in 2025. Bubna holds a bachelor's degree in Computer Science from the IIT Bombay. H e is iknown for his work n mapping, navigation, and connected-car technologies. Prior to founding NextBillion.ai in 2020, he served in at Ola in India and Grab in Singapole. In 2022 and 2023, he was named among the “40 Under 40” by ''Fortune India''.
Biography
Gaurav Bubna was born and raised in Mumbai, India. In 2009 he graduated from the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay with a B.Tech. in Computer Science.
Career
Bubna began his career in quantitative finance. From 2009 to 2012 Bubna worked as a Quantitative Analyst at Morgan Stanley in New York. In 2012 he shifted into the tech startup scene by co-founding Zlemma, a recruitment search platform for STEM candidates, where he served as Head of Product. Zlemma was later acquired by Hired.com. During his time at Zlemma he co-developed the core search engine and filed U.S. patent applications related to that work.
In 2016 Bubna returned to India to join ANI Technologies (Ola) as associate director of Product Management. At Ola he was a founding member and product head of Ola Play, a connected-car infotainment platform for ride-sharing vehicles. The Ola Play project contributed several patent applications and helped Ola secure an investment partnership with Microsoft.
In April 2017 Bubna moved to Singapore to join Grab, Southeast Asia's leading super-app. He became Head of Product, ETAs and Navigation on Grab's newly formed Maps team. Bubna also led strategic initiatives at Grab, including a joint venture with SK Telecom in South Korea.
In 2020 Bubna co-founded NextBillion.ai alongside Ajay Bulusu and Shaolin Zheng. NextBillion.ai offers enterprise-grade mapping and route-optimization APIs tailored to different industries. The startup raised a $21 million Series B funding round in May 2022, contributing to over $34 million total raised. In October 2025 NextBillion.ai was fully acquired by Velocitor Solutions (a fleet management software firm). As part of Velocitor, NextBillion.ai's AI-driven mapping technology is integrated with telematics and fleet management solutions.