$15M Series A: Surat's Rocket Raises from Accel & Salesforce Ventures to Scale AI-Powered App Building
Rocket, one of India's first vibe-coding startups founded by Surat IT Community member Vishal Virani, has raised $15M in Series A funding led by Accel with participation from Salesforce Ventures — a landmark moment for Surat's global tech ambition.
The Story
When Vishal Virani and his co-founders sat down in Surat and decided to build a platform that lets anyone create full-stack applications by simply describing what they want — in plain English — most of the startup world wasn't paying attention to Tier-2 India. That has now changed.
Rocket has raised $15 million in Series A funding, led by Accel with participation from Salesforce Ventures and existing investors. For Surat's IT Community, this is not just a funding round. It is proof that world-class, venture-backed product companies can be built right here.
Rocket belongs to a new category the industry is calling "vibe coding" — where developers and non-developers alike describe software in natural language and AI generates production-ready code. Rocket is one of the earliest and most ambitious bets on this vision, and the $15M round signals that global investors believe the future belongs to platforms like it.
The company already serves 50,000+ users across 80+ countries. From solo founders who launched their first SaaS product in a weekend, to engineering teams at growth-stage startups who use Rocket to ship 10x faster — the platform has proven its value at scale. Accel and Salesforce Ventures saw a product that was not just growing, but reshaping how the world builds software.
Vishal has been a part of the Surat IT Community for years. In the early days, SIC member companies were among Rocket's first honest testers — giving brutal, real-world feedback that shaped the product roadmap. That community trust, that Surat-bred grit, is embedded in every line of Rocket's DNA.
The Series A capital will be used to scale Rocket's AI infrastructure, expand the product's capabilities for enterprise customers, and grow the team globally. The Surat core team remains central to the mission.
For every SIC member who has wondered whether building a global SaaS product from Surat is possible — Rocket's $15M Series A is your answer. One of our own just walked into a room with Accel and Salesforce Ventures, and walked out with a mandate to change how the world builds software.
"Surat gave us our foundation — the hunger, the work ethic, and the community of founders who believed before anyone else did. This round is as much theirs as it is ours."