Indian American entrepreneur Kalyani Ramadurgam has earned a spot on Forbes 30 Under 30 USA 2026 in Finance. Before launching her own venture, Ramadurgam held a high-pressure role at Apple, where she was responsible for preventing individuals on terrorism watch lists from accessing Apple Pay.
The stakes were immense, but what struck her most wasn’t the responsibility, it was the outdated methods used to ensure compliance. Even at one of the world’s most technologically advanced companies, processes that should have been streamlined were still manual, slow, and cumbersome, highlighting a gap between innovation and regulatory execution. “It meant reading through not just hundreds, but thousands of pages of documentation,” she shared with Forbes.
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“Organizations were just throwing bodies at the problem,” Ramadurgam recalled. That firsthand experience with inefficient compliance processes left a lasting impression. Her innovative approach and impact eventually earned her a place on Forbes 30 Under 30 USA 2026 in Finance.
In 2023, Ramadurgam collaborated with Ashi Agrawal, a former software engineer at Affirm, to launch new venture Kobalt Labs with a mission to modernize compliance. Their approach was both straightforward and ambitious: leverage AI to handle the workload that had been overwhelming human teams.
Kobalt’s technology scans vast amounts of documents, helping banks and financial institutions evaluate their business partners. The system ensures companies follow critical regulations, from blocking transactions linked to sanctioned countries to promptly reporting security breaches, tasks that previously could take weeks or even months to complete manually.
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The strategy is already showing results. Kobalt Labs has secured $13 million in funding and serves over 20 clients, including Celtic Bank and the rapidly expanding fintech Bilt.
For Ramadurgam, the goal goes beyond efficiency. She aims to modernize a system that safeguards the financial world while easing the burden on the teams tasked with keeping it compliant.
Kobalt Labs is a New York-based startup that develops AI-driven software to streamline risk management, compliance, and third-party due diligence for banks and fintech firms. Its tools quickly analyze contracts, policies, and regulatory documents, flagging potential risks or compliance gaps in minutes—work that would normally take human teams much longer. By automating these processes, Kobalt Labs helps financial institutions scale faster while cutting down on time-consuming and costly manual labor.