No IIT. No NIT. No home computer. Growing up in Hyderabad, Soumith Chintala used his neighbour’s computer to learn coding—proving early on that passion and curiosity outweigh access to luxury.

Self-described as “bad at maths” and rejected by 27 US universities, Soumith refused to let numbers or setbacks define his path. His persistence eventually earned him a spot at New York University.

At NYU, Soumith began working alongside Yann LeCun, a founding father of deep learning. This pivotal collaboration set the foundation for his future contributions to artificial intelligence.

The path wasn’t linear. Facing multiple job rejections and visa complications that forced him to leave the US temporarily, Soumith repeatedly picked himself up and kept pushing forward.

In 2014, Soumith joined Meta AI (FAIR). Recognizing the need for a more flexible deep learning framework, he co-created PyTorch—a tool designed by researchers, for researchers.

From Meta and Tesla to OpenAI and autonomous driving systems, PyTorch quickly grew to power nearly 90% of global AI research and modern machine learning ecosystems.

Over eight years of leadership, Soumith scaled PyTorch from an open-source experiment into the industry standard, rising through the ranks to become Vice President at Meta. From a student in Hyderabad without a PC to the CTO of Thinking Machines Lab, Soumith Chintala’s journey is a testament to grit, open-source innovation, and relentless execution.