Kushal
Lokesh

Engineer, inventor, founder and CTO.

Kushal Lokesh is a mechanical engineer turned full-stack founder. He holds six granted patents from his years in Schneider Electric's Wiring Devices R&D, founded Kluarc Technologies — a bootstrapped AR studio whose products shipped worldwide for Mitel and were built alongside Mercedes-Benz R&D — and built Web3onwards, a 2,000-student product-building community across three Bengaluru campuses.

He is now Technical Director & CTO of Membrane, a live attention marketplace that has paid ₹28.9 lakh to more than 5,000 verified earners — grown almost entirely by referral.

Kushal Lokesh
Bengaluru · est. 2012
Fourteen yearsScrub the track
2012
About / the fourteen-year arc

Fourteen years of building things that ship.

I started by proving I could invent inside a giant: a plug-and-play electrical system that went from a hand-built prototype on my desk to the CEO's table and four countries of patents. Then I left to own the whole thing.

Kluarc was where a ten-person bootstrapped team built AR products that Mitel shipped worldwide and Mercedes-Benz engineers built alongside. Kluarc taught me that great products with no distribution stall — so the next thing I built was distribution itself.

Web3onwards is two thousand students across three campuses learning to build on open foundations. Membrane is where all of it lands: a marketplace that pays those students for verified attention, priced by measured behaviour, grown almost entirely by referral.

The through-line: full production systems end to end — hardware, identity, ML scoring, payments, marketplaces — and shipping them. Not slideware.

Now

Technical Director & CTO, Membrane (NFThing) · Director, NFThing Limited, London. Operating founder-executive across tech, product, growth and ops.

B.E. Mechanical Engineering, R.V. College of Engineering — First Class with Distinction. Formula SAE Italy 2011 with Ashwa Racing.

6granted patents, 4 jurisdictions
€150KCEO-backed MVP funding at Schneider
7countries Mitel AR shipped to
2,000+students onboarded, zero ad spend
11,880Membrane sign-ups, 65% by referral
₹28.9Lpaid to 5,284 verified earners
Chapter 1 / Wiring Devices R&D · Bengaluru

Schneider Electric

2012 — 2017·five years·Mechanical → Design → Product Engineer

Joined straight out of RVCE, named best of the graduate batch in year one. Then invented plug-and-play switches and sockets — a wiring frame where a socket works wherever you put it — and built the prototypes by hand when nobody believed the slides.

The idea went to the CEO's table, earned €150K of MVP funding and six patents across four countries.

6granted patents
4jurisdictions
€150KCEO-backed MVP
4contest podiums
#1of the 2013 batch
2036patents in force to
    Why it matters
  • First-named inventoron the universal installation system — US, EP, CN, IN
  • Presented to the CEOand used to reframe India R&D from cost centre to innovation centre
  • Still on shelvesMureva Styl, Multifix Ultra and the Unica catalogue, a decade on
  • Left to found Kluarcafter proving he could invent inside a giant
The invention · demo film

Plug-and-play switches & sockets

Live, neutral and earth — wherever you put it · 6 patents · US EP CN IN · €150K MVP
2013 · first year

Most Promising Newcomer

  • Best of the entire graduate-engineer batch
  • Won before the inventing started
Joined Wiring Devices R&D straight out of RVCE.
Most Promising Newcomer 2013 crystal trophy
Crystal trophy · Promising New Comer 2013
2014 · Innovision

Runner-Up, all of Schneider India R&D

  • 2nd within Wiring Devices first
  • Concept: plug-and-play switches and sockets
Nobody bought it from slides — the idea broke the rule that a socket lives where the electrician drilled. Hand-built prototypes did the convincing.
Innovision 2014 Runner-Up trophy
Innovision 2014 · Runner-Up trophy
2015 · executive sponsorship

Presented to the CEO

  • Pitched personally to Jean-Pascal Tricoire
  • A full-time engineer, a prototyping budget, a launch mandate for Europe or India
  • India R&D reframed: cost centre → product-innovation centre
€150Kinternal MVP funding
2016 · Retail Innovation Contest

1st Runner-up of 140 ideas

  • Business-wide, across Schneider Electric
  • Third podium in three years
Meanwhile shipping end to end — Mureva Styl, Multifix Ultra, the Unica switch catalogue — all still in catalogue a decade on.
Retail Innovation Contest 2016 certificate
Certificate · Retail Innovation Contest 2015–16
2017 · Innovative Idea

The pop-up socket

  • A flush 6/16A socket that rises out of the worksurface
  • Driven by the plug itself — no motor, no push-latch, one part fewer
  • Indian Patent 413892, granted 2022
Innovative Idea 2017 certificate
Certificate · Innovative Idea 2017
2019 – 2022 · granted

Six patents, four jurisdictions

  • First-named inventor on the universal installation system
  • In force to 2036 and 2039
US 10,411,420 B2Universal · US
EP 3089293 B1Universal · EU
CN 106099561 BUniversal · CN
IN 489/KOL/2015Universal · IN
EP 3534472 B1Install. box · EU
IN 413892Pop-up socket · IN
03 · Kluarc Technologies · Bangalore · 2018 – 2023
kluarc

Built Mitel's global-winning AR app, shipped to seven countries. Selected by Daimler to build with Mercedes-Benz engineers. Runner-up at the nasscom ai × IBM Grand Challenge. Nine people, no funding.

Co-founder · CEO & CTOBootstrapped · team of 9–1010 products · 5 years
Mercedes-Benz outcome pitch: i-Tester, credited to Kushal Lokesh, Co-founder, Kluarc TechnologiesStartup Autobahn India · Expo Day · 4 Sep 2020
Daimler · Mercedes-Benz R&D India · 2020
Built i-Tester with Mercedes-Benz R&D India
One of four startups in Startup Autobahn India, Batch 2. Pitched with MBRDI engineers at Expo Day, 1,000+ attendees.
inView on LinkedIn
1st
Global final · 13 teams
Mitel · global · 2020
Mitel Shark Tank, global winner
1st in India over 30+ teams, then the global final. Mitel AR shipped to seven countries.
Runner-up trophy and certificate, AI for Business Grand Challenge
nasscom ai × IBM · Sep 2023
Runner-up, AI for Business Grand Challenge
Customer Care category — AR Remote Assistance, evolved with AI.
Nasscom 10000 Startups showcase, January 2022, featuring Kluarc
Nasscom 10000 Startups · Jan 2022
Startups Showcase feature
January 2022 edition; also listed in the NIPP Open Innovation Bulletin.
7
countries where Mitel installers use Mitel AR
~40%
less machine downtime with AR Remote Assistance
4: 1
resolutions per support engineer, from one
1of 4
startups in Startup Autobahn India Batch 2
7wks
from incorporation to first pitch — Facebook, via T-Hub

The two products that mattered

Labels appear as things happen in each clip
Step 1Installer picks the 6900 series
Point at the deviceBrackets track it live
Recognised · MiVoice 6940Its 3D manual and setup steps overlay next
01Cat360 → Mitel AR · Android & iOS · 2020

Point the phone at the device. The manual appears on it.

Cat360 turns an OEM's paper manuals into a 3D, camera-aware guide. Mitel shipped it to installers and channel partners as Mitel AR after it won their global Shark Tank.

Problem

Mitel installers configuring VoIP hardware in the field from PDF manuals.

We built

Device recognition through the camera, then the catalogue, setup steps and troubleshooting overlaid in 3D on the device itself.

Result

7 countries · 1st in Mitel's global Shark Tank over 13 finalists

Expert · at a desk
Customer · on site
Live · same viewBoth phones show the customer's engine, in real time.
Expert drawsCircles the part on the live video
AR · on the real enginePinned to the part, not the screen
InstructionAn arrow: lift here
Customer followsHands on the part, no call-back
02AR Remote Assistance · SaaS · 2019 – 23

Fix the machine without sending the technician.

A video call where the expert draws on the customer's live camera view and the drawing stays pinned to the real part — so instructions arrive as marks on the machine, not descriptions of it.

Problem

OEM support teams flew technicians out for faults a call should solve — but a call can't point.

We built

A video call where the expert draws on the customer's live camera view, and the drawing stays pinned to the machine in AR.

Result

~40% less machine downtime · Runner-up, nasscom ai × IBM Grand Challenge

Also built: Klu-Project, Klu-Walk, Klu-360, Klu-Portal, Klu-Estate, a metaverse events platform. Read the full Kluarc chapter →Clients: Mitel · Mercedes-Benz R&D India · RGBSI
chapter 03 · founder & director · 2023 — present

I built a 2,000-student product community from a lecture hall, then built the products it graduated into.

Full chapter →
++++·:
web3onwards.com
web3onwards
A decentralised movement to_
BUILD it DIFFERENTLY
community
2,000+students · 3 campuses · ₹0 ads
MOUs signed
3RIT · BMSIT · BIT
team filmplays on your domain2024
mentor
45coached into a shipping team
judging
3×invited back to judge hackathons
UPSKILL

5 tracks · 30 tasks · ~45 h · 1,335 users on web3onwards.com

CONTRIBUTE

Finish the ladder, earn a seat on the product team

BUILD

Ship DeFlix — reviews as ERC-721 on Polygon

GROW

Own a team, mentor the next intake

DeFlix, the decentralised movie-review platform built by Web3onwards students
DeFlix · shipped & demoed

Decentralised movie reviewsflagship

“IMDb on the blockchain.” PRD and GTM written in-house; 45 students across four teams shipped it from RIT and BMSIT.

onboarding · built as a product
  • 01In-person session → live MetaMask setup
  • 02QR guide → web form → database
  • 03WhatsApp + Discord welcome bots
  • 04NFT certificate at /mint, shared on LinkedIn
Web3onwards team, 2023 to 2024▶Team ’23 → ’242.4k
growth
1,335platform users · 356 peak MAU · 76% direct
mentoring

Testimonial slot — one student, one line.students I taught still stay in touch

Chapter 4 / Technical Director & CTO · NFThing · 2025 — present
MEMBRANE

340 students told a friend. Seventeen generations later, it's 5,254.

A social network for Indian college students, in stealth. Every dot is a KYC-verified member, placed on the ring of the generation they joined in. I built the stack underneath; the students built the tree.

5,254
verified members · 17 generations
Scrub the growthNov 2025 → Sep 2026, week by week
12 Sep 2026
Case file / the one I can't talk about yet
CategorySocial network · · mobile-first
AudienceCollege students, India. Bengaluru first — 23 campuses, average age 19.4
What it does
Business model
Members12,037 signed up · 5,254 passed video KYC and activated · 72% Aadhaar-verified
Growth98.8% referred by another member · 340 seeds → 17 generations · ₹0 paid acquisition
Retention80% month-to-month, averaged · peak 89% · MAU 67 → 2,934 in seven months
Scale19M feed impressions · 57,652 posts · 92,337 comments · 19,140 DMs · peak hour 8 PM
My remitFull stack — identity (Aadhaar / DigiLocker, video liveness), LLM ranking pipelines, the feed, payments, data platform & MCP. Plus product, growth and ops.
StatusLive. Stealth. planned
Details on request · in person
0.99K
virality coefficient — 98.8% of verified members were referred by a member
94%
of the network was recruited by someone who was themselves recruited
80%
month-to-month retention, averaged over ten months
44×
monthly actives, October to May · 67 → 2,934

If you're a brand, an investor, or a student at one of the 23 campuses, write to me and I'll fill in the bars.

Evidence wall

13 exhibits · 8 cleared · 5 withheld · nothing on screen you could reverse-engineer
Exhibit A · filmCleared
16:9 · 12–15 s loop · muted · 1920×1080 + poster
Campus, 7–8 PM (peak hour). Over the shoulder; the phone screen is out of focus by lens, not by post.
Where it happensBengaluru · evening · one continuous take
Exhibit B · the appWithheld
MEMBRANE
Screenshot withheldAndroid · the only screen you get is the lock screen
Exhibit C · dataCleared
Members per generationgen 4 is the biggest · 549 members · chains reach 17
Exhibit D · photoCleared
4:5 still · ≥2400 px
Onboarding session, RIT or BMSIT. Phones up, wordmark on the projector, nothing legible on screens.
Where the tree startsa lecture hall · RIT 1,822 · BMSIT 1,331 · BMSCE 1,319
Exhibit E · dataCleared
Bengaluru, by regionnorth 2,901 · south 1,867 · central 215 · west 116 · east 88
paid acquisition, eleven months
₹0

The marketing budget is the members.

Exhibit G · filmWithheld
4:5 · 8 s loop · muted
You at the whiteboard, architecture diagram behind you — shot at f/1.8 so the boxes are shapes, not words.
The architecturelegible to you · not to the camera
Exhibit H · dataCleared
A day on Membranequietest 4 AM · busiest 8 PM · every hour 9 AM–11 PM clears 15,000 events
Exhibit I · photoCleared
4:5 still
Founding team, one frame, no laptops open. Or you alone with the London company papers, if the team prefers to stay unnamed.
NFThing LimitedLondon · Bengaluru · the people, not the product
Exhibit J · photoWithheld
9:16 still, cropped
A real phone on a desk, lock screen showing a stack of Membrane notifications — count visible, bodies blurred in post.
Wednesday, 8:14 PM14 notifications · contents withheld
Exhibit K · dataCleared
New verified members per weekpeak 489 in the last week of November · 45 weeks
Exhibit L · objectCleared
1:1 still, top-down
Whatever physical thing the first 340 handed out — a printed QR card, a sticker, a poster — photographed on a desk like evidence. If nothing existed, print one now; it's true to how it spread.
How 340 became 5,254the invite, as an object
Exhibit M · audioWithheld
30 s · MP3 · shown as a waveform, transcript redacted — a student explaining Membrane to a friend, with consent.
Word of mouth, literallytranscript withheld
Tree drawn from the real root, generation and invites-per-referrer distributions; individual placements are synthetic. All figures: production DB via the Membrane MCP.12 Sep 2026
Intellectual property

Four inventions, six grantsUS · EP · CN · IN — all from the Schneider Electric years. Rights held by Schneider Electric Industries SAS. Verified on Google Patents, August 2026.

InventionGrants / filingsKey datesStatus
Universal Electrical Installation System
first-named inventor		US 10,411,420 B2
EP 3089293 B1
CN 106099561 B
IN 489/KOL/2015		Priority 30 Apr 2015
US granted 10 Sep 2019
EP granted 9 Oct 2019		Active · expiry 2036
Electrical Installation Box
Multifix Ultra		EP 3534472 B1
IN 201841007784		Priority 1 Mar 2018
EP granted 23 Mar 2022		Active · in force to 2039
Pop-Up Electrical SocketIN 413892Granted 2022Granted, India
Assembly for a Socket or a SwitchIN 201641008782Filed 2016Filed
US 10,411,420 — abstract

A universal electrical installation system including a fixing frame having a top part with provisions for fixation of an insert, a bottom part configured to be engaged with the top part, wherein the bottom part comprises provisions for terminal blocks that are capable of being attached or removed at any desired location … current carrying electrical rails housed within the fixing frame … disposed along the entirety of the fixing frame in a manner that when the insert is engaged therein, one or more conductive elements of the insert is capable of interfacing with the said current carrying electrical rails in multiple positions.

US grant PDF ↗  ·  EP 3534472 B1 grant PDF ↗

EP 3534472 B1 — drawing sheets
EP 3534472 B1 drawing sheet 1
EP 3534472 B1 drawing sheet 2
EP 3534472 B1 drawing sheet 3
EP 3534472 B1 drawing sheet 4
EP 3534472 B1 drawing sheet 5
Recognition / master chronology

2011 → 2026

2011
Formula SAE Italy — Ashwa Racing, RVCE, Riccardo Paletti Circuit
Undergraduate
2012
B.E. Mechanical, First Class with Distinction, CGPA 8.38
RVCE / VTU
2013
Most Promising Newcomer — best of graduate batch
Schneider Electric
2013
Inspirate 2013
Schneider Electric
2014
Innovision 2014 — Finale Contestant & Runner-Up
Schneider India R&D
2016
Retail Innovation Contest 2015–16 — 1st Runner-up of 140 ideas
Schneider Electric
2017
Innovative Idea 2017 — pop-up socket
Schneider Electric
2013–17
Pat on the Back · 2× Patent Awards · 3- and 5-year service plaques
Schneider Electric
2019–22
Six patents granted across US, EP, CN, IN
Schneider Electric Industries SAS
2020
Startup Autobahn India, Batch 2 — powered by Mercedes-Benz
Kluarc
2020
Top-10 finalist, Infineon Startup India AI Challenge
Kluarc
2020–21
Winner, Mitel global internal Shark Tank; Mitel AR shipped in 7 countries
Kluarc
2022
Nasscom 10,000 Startups / NIPP Startups Showcase feature
Kluarc
2023
Runner-Up, nasscom ai × IBM AI for Business Grand Challenge — Customer Care
Kluarc
2023
MOUs with Ramaiah Institute of Technology, BMSIT, BIT
Web3onwards
2025
Judge, CODE RED '25 (BMSIT&M) · Dignitary, amBITion 2.0 (BIT)
Web3onwards
2026
Membrane: 11,880 users, ₹28.9L paid, 65% referral-driven
Membrane
Media / everything in one place

Archive

Contact

Building something?Kushal is based in Bengaluru and works across hardware, AR, identity, marketplaces and growth.

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