We’re excited to share that Rahul Patil, CTO of Anthropic, has joined Gusto’s Board of Directors.
Rahul joins Gusto at a defining moment. Today, we serve more than 400,000 small businesses, and our due north is to make their lives easier. With AI rapidly changing what’s possible, entrepreneurship is entering a new era. Barriers to starting and scaling a business are falling, products that help small businesses are becoming dramatically smarter, and millions of people now have access to capabilities that previously required entire teams.
At Gusto, we’re building toward a future where AI isn’t just an enterprise advantage. We’re building for this next chapter in a way that will strengthen the small business economy for years to come.
Harnessing the power and potential of AI for small business
Rahul is a technologist whose work is expanding access to opportunity. Over the past two decades, he has helped build and scale some of the most trusted technical systems in the world: from leading product and infrastructure at Anthropic, to serving as CTO of Stripe (where he also ran Global Operations), to shaping next-generation cloud infrastructure at Oracle, AWS, and Microsoft. His career has been defined by making complex systems simpler and more accessible, exactly the kind of experience and thinking that will further accelerate Gusto in the age of AI.
What drew us to Rahul, and what resonated with him, was more than technical fit. It was mission fit.
Rahul has a deep personal connection to small businesses: his father still runs an independent medical clinic in Bengaluru, and his mother built and ran a neighborhood computer tutoring center. Rahul grew up seeing what it takes to build something from the ground up: long hours, community trust, and the belief that meaningful work can change lives.
When Eddie, Tomer, and I first met Rahul, our values clicked immediately. As he puts it, “Small businesses are the heartbeat of America. They’re a person’s bet on themselves—someone’s first job, someone else’s second chance. Gusto’s mission to make that possible really resonated.”
As AI opens the door for more people to start and scale businesses on their own, we’re excited to welcome Rahul to the Gusto Board team. He sees AI’s promise in unlocking new value, reducing friction, and helping more people turn ideas into livelihoods.
A new, AI-enabled era of entrepreneurship
At Gusto, everything starts with the small business owner and their team. We know they’re still wearing countless hats, juggling day-to-day operations while navigating an ever-growing list of compliance responsibilities. We’re here to make that load lighter. To be their teammate and their partner. We’re building Gusto to be proactive, conversational, and available wherever and whenever they need it. Not technology for technology’s sake, but a partner that is genuinely helpful.
And the moment we’re in right now is big for small businesses. AI has the potential to open the doors of entrepreneurship wider than ever before, and we’ll have more to share on how in the months ahead as we continue to bring our vision to life. We’re building toward a future where anyone can start and grow a business with confidence, and where a thriving small business economy continues to power communities everywhere.
We’re energized for what’s ahead and committed to ensuring this new era of AI lifts up the people and communities who make the small business economy so powerful.
