Hi everyone ,
Background: I’m a Senior Cloud & DevOps Engineer based in the UK, and the Founder & Product Owner of an AI-powered SaaS operations platform for UK service businesses — fully launched, with paying customers now onboarded.
Criteria: MC1 + OC2 + OC3
MC1 evidence:
• Speaker at Conf42 Cloud Native 2025 (March 2025) — fully public talk page, transcript, slides, photo, letter from CEO
• Speaker at Geekle AI Transformation Summit 2025 (March 2025) — detailed CEO letter, signed certificate, public speaker card, 3,000+ viewers, alongside Amazon and Warner Bros speakers
• Published interview in a tech media platform (May 2024) — live page, 8,220+ views, full interview on DevOps and AI
OC2 evidence:
• DevOps Judge at Atlassian’s Codegeist 2024 (Oct-Dec 2024) — 3,747 participants, $170k prize pool, detailed letter from Devpost. Name not publicly listed on their site — letter only. Is this a real risk?
• Organiser of Women in Product India “A Day with AI” (November 2024) — 110+ attendees, letter from founder naming 12 AI startup founders including YC-backed companies. No public event page exists. Letter only. Same concern.
• Technical Judge at AI in EdTech Hackathon (June-July 2026) — 1,139+ participants, publicly listed on judges page, confirmed welcome email. Timing concern — concludes 2 July, submitting August/September.
OC3 evidence:
• Founder & Product Owner of a live, paying-customer AI SaaS platform — 10 months solo build
• Company website now clearly reads as product-led (previous refusal cited this specifically)
• Public founder page on company website
• Two signed paying customer contracts with independent companies
• Architecture diagrams and individual contribution documentation
• Letter from company confirming founder role
Three referees:
• Direct technical colleague — same team on a Pricing AI project, also informally reviewed my product architecture during build. Currently at a separate UK company (independent). Primary referee.
• Current CEO of a major international startup incubator (3,000+ startups) — met in person in India, discussed my product and AI approach before his current appointment. Credible senior figure, but India-based. Does India-based carry less weight than UK-based?
• UK-based AI founder and CEO, London — met at a conference, discussed my product specifically. Independent, verifiable LinkedIn profile, 20,000+ followers.
I would really appreciate any feedback or review from experienced members here. This is my second attempt and I want to make sure I’m not missing anything before I submit. Even a quick comment on the weakest parts would mean a lot.
Tagging some members who might be able to help: @raphael @francisca_chiedu @akash_joshi @ramesh — thank you so much in advance for your time!