Unstop, an Indian talent engagement and hiring platform for students and early-career job seekers, has acquired PerspectAI, a company that uses games and AI to assess job candidates. The deal was announced on September 17, 2026.
Unstop took on PerspectAI's technology, intellectual property, data, clients and revenue through an all-equity swap, Dealroom reported. Financial terms were not disclosed. PerspectAI was profitable in the financial year 2026, so Unstop is buying an operating business rather than only a product or a team.
All PerspectAI employees, including its founders and its engineering, quality and applied psychology teams, are joining Unstop. Entrepreneur India described the transaction as an agreement to be completed later; Dealroom reported it as closed.
What PerspectAI built
PerspectAI combines what it calls game science, data science and people science. Its assessments draw on psychometrics, cognitive and behavioural science and AI to produce indicators of a candidate's employability, fit for a role and likely workplace performance, rather than relying only on CVs and conventional tests.
Its enterprise clients include Aditya Birla Capital, Tata Sons, Swiggy and Motilal Oswal, in sectors ranging from banking and education to manufacturing and consumer technology. CB Insights lists the company as based in Hyderabad, founded in 2017 and previously known as Loop Reality. It offers game-based assessments, personality and skills tests, programming and English proficiency tests, and AI video interviews.
PerspectAI did not disclose its revenue, headcount or outside funding.
“PerspectAI is not a bet on a roadmap. It is a product that large, demanding enterprises already trust and pay for.”
Why Unstop is buying
Unstop plans to offer PerspectAI's assessment tools to its own customers, including campus recruiters, lateral hiring teams and large enterprises, and to sell its talent engagement products to PerspectAI's enterprise clients.
Founder and CEO Ankit Aggarwal said PerspectAI was a product that large enterprises already trust and pay for, not a bet on a future roadmap. He also said Unstop was bringing in a team that had spent years developing new ways to measure talent and potential.
The two PerspectAI co-founders take on new roles. Chief executive Jignesh Talasila will lead Unstop's expansion into the education and government segments, and chief technology officer Suraj Vanka will join Unstop's product leadership team.
Unstop's path so far
Ankit Aggarwal founded Unstop in 2017. It describes itself as a community engagement platform where students and recent graduates can learn, take part in competitions, practise for recruiters' tests, get mentoring and apply for jobs. In August 2023 it raised $5 million in its first institutional funding round, led by Japanese job board and HR technology company Mynavi, with Coursera, Venture Catalysts, 9Unicorns and Pankaj Bansal's Caret Capital also taking part, Inc42 reported. At the time Unstop said it had a community of about six million students and graduates from more than 20,000 colleges, about two million monthly active users, and more than 800 companies, including Flipkart, Amazon, Reliance and Tata, hiring from the platform. Inc42 named Xiaomi India, Accenture, Flipkart and the Aditya Birla Group among the sponsors of its jobs and competitions, which means some of PerspectAI's clients, such as Aditya Birla Capital, sit inside groups that already work with Unstop.
Because the deal was paid for in Unstop shares rather than cash, PerspectAI's owners take a stake in the enlarged company instead of an exit payout. Neither company disclosed how large that stake is or what value the swap placed on either business.
AI moves into hiring
The deal comes as Indian employers shift hiring towards AI skills. Dealroom cited data showing that AI-related hiring in India's IT sector rose 16% year on year in June 2026, while overall IT recruitment fell 3%.
Assessment tools that use behavioural and cognitive data also raise questions about how that data is governed, Dealroom noted, an issue Unstop will need to address as it offers PerspectAI's tests to a much larger base of students and employers.
