Naveen Tewari’s boldest bet yet: How Glance AI is turning selfies into style statements

Naveen Tewari is pioneering new technology yet again. 

After InMobi’s globally successful B2B adtech platform and Glance’s innovative lock screen content discovery tool, the serial entrepreneur’s third ambitious bet is Glance AI—a cutting-edge AI commerce solution that aspires to redefine the retail shopping experience across the world. 

Fresh from the grand launch of Glance AI in the United States, Tewari unabashedly declares this endeavour to be his “biggest, boldest bet” in 18 years, since he established InMobi—which became India’s first ever unicorn in 2011. “I see this as the ChatGPT moment for shopping,” he tells The CapTable in an exclusive chat on the heels of Glance AI’s rollout in 140 countries. 

“Just as we hailed cabs before and after Uber, how we searched online before and after ChatGPT, how we made payments before and after UPI... similarly, how we shopped before Glance AI and after Glance AI will fundamentally change,” he explains. 

It’s a ‘big, bold’ declaration indeed, especially considering that Glance AI is entirely crafted in India by a dedicated team of 250 AI engineers who are focused on developing a truly innovative Gen AI product. With Glance’s parent company investing nearly $200 million in the agentic AI platform—which had been operating in a closed beta for three months before its expansive launch six weeks ago—it is already seeing impressive traction in the West. 

Currently, the platform boasts 1.5 million weekly users, each generating 18 personalized AI looks and styles daily; Glance AI has accumulated close to 40 million style requests with a resoundingly positive and “emotional” consumer response, Tewari claims. “People are falling in love with themselves. They are experiencing and getting inspired by many possibilities [when it comes to fashion and style]. Yes, we are talking about hardcore transactions and all of those things. But the beauty of this is that it is an emotional product,” he notes.

But what really sets Glance AI apart at a time when the buzz around agentic AI and AI-driven experiential commerce are louder than ever? And why is the InMobi Group committing significant resources to this product—which it believes will touch 100 million users in six months—which not only requires substantial investment in building core tech models, but also faces mounting competition from Big Tech, including Google, Meta and Amazon, with each wanting a slice of the growing AI commerce pie?