Contrario has already managed to onboard a talent pool of over 2000 applicants from Ivy League schools like Stanford University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Carnegie Mellon University
By Ada Jain
Most students wish for a speed dial during the job-hunt process; two Indian American Stanford dropouts have created Contrario to make job search and recruiting smoother. Contrario offers the “world’s first 100% autonomous AI recruiting agency” for top talent, according to backer Y Combinator.
“The job market is broken,” according to founders Arya Mahawa and Aditya Sood. Mahawa’s unique personal experiences as a recruiter at SOS study, an online tutoring startup, and Sood’s journey as a candidate who has also worked at federal organizations such as NASA and United States Department of Defense, led the two to build Contrario.
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Headquartered in San Francisco, Contrario is a native AI recruiting platform for engineers that claims to onboard candidates within 30 seconds. It leverages predictive AI talent mapping and natural language processing to create advanced algorithmic matches for companies. The candidate undergoes an interview with Nova, a conversational AI agent, providing real time technical assessments in artificial intelligence and machine learning to assess how well engineers code with the latest AI developer tools like Cursor and ChatGPT.
At the end of 2024, the labor market for recent college graduates has experienced an upward trend. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, employment in architecture and engineering occupations is projected to grow faster than the average for all occupations from 2023 to 2033. About 195,000 openings are projected each year, on average in these occupations.
Yet, across the world, as cohorts step out of elite graduate schools, finding a job through job boards is often fraught with complaints of employer ghosting, talent-gap challenges and biased Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) which rely heavily on keyword matching and outdated algorithms. According to a report by Boston Consulting group, talent gap risks short-circuiting the progress of several essential industries. It may also seriously inhibit various U.S. government initiatives intended to boost the economy and competitiveness, such as the 2022 Build Back Better Act (BBBA) and the 2022 Chips and Science Act.
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With innovative platforms like Contrario, it might be a step forward for the American employment systems and policies. Contrario has already managed to onboard a talent pool of over 2000 applicants from Ivy League schools like Stanford University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Carnegie Mellon University. They also work with startups, top enterprises and mid-sized businesses like Luminai, Soff, Cicero, Slash among others, many of which automate tasks for its customers at the backend.
With the upheaval of GPT-3 in 2020, many startups have seen lower barriers of entry wanting to incorporate AI capabilities. Also, investors have become more willing to invest in products with native AI. Unlike companies that later add AI features to existing products, AI-native startups design their entire tech stack around AI capabilities from day one. Contrario is likely to replace legacy staffing firms like Manpower, Robert Half, and Adecco as they scale beyond IT.