AI Engineer Melbourne Conference

Every ride you book on Uber or Ola has 100+ engineers behind it.

19Cabs has 1 + AI — and it’s on the road right now.

Building & running a real ride-hailing company with AI as the team

The Bet

Most companies add AI as a feature.

I used AI as the team.

To think the idea → design the solution → build the apps → run the business.

This is real

Meet 19Cabs — a live cab service in Kanpur

1644

Rides completed

1460

Active drivers

1147

Customers

Customer app · Driver app · Backend · Pricing · Dispatch — all shipped.

Not an MVP — a full product

Shipped features, end to end

↕ Fare adjust ⤓ Fare-too-low decline ⛟ Multi-vehicle select ⇄ Book for others ▣ Parcel delivery ⏱ Scheduled rides ⇉ Fair fast matching ♥ Driver referrals

Built with AI — in days, not sprints.

Customer app

How I used AI · 1 of 3

Idea & Strategy

AI as a thinking partner — market, model, pricing logic
Stress-tested edge cases before writing code
Turned a vague idea into a concrete plan in days

How I used AI · 2 of 3

End-to-End Solution Design

System architecture & data model — designed with AI
One coherent design across app + backend + pricing + dispatch
Trade-offs explored fast, fewer costly rewrites

How I used AI · 3 of 3

Building the Apps — shipped

Customer · book & bid fare

Driver · accept or negotiate

+ backend, pricing & dispatch — AI wrote, debugged, iterated — 10× throughput

From data to intelligence

Live demand & driver map

1,460+ drivers on a live map.

See where demand is in real time
Position drivers before it hits
Fewer empty miles, faster pickups

The Payoff

What this bought me

Weeks to build, not years

1 + AI

Team size

$$$$$$

Time / cost saved

Speed and cost that a full team couldn’t match.

What’s next

AI for Trust & Intelligence

Fake / fraud ride detection Driver & customer ranking Demand forecasting Smart dispatch & matching Dynamic pricing Multilingual AI support Safety anomaly detection

From building with AI → operating with AI.

The takeaway

The real shift isn’t AI features.

It’s leverage over headcount.

AI collapses the distance from idea → production.
One motivated builder can now move like a team.

June 3–4, 2026 · Federation Square, Melbourne

19Cabs is what 1 person + AI can build.

Imagine what your team can.

Balram Singh

Founder · 19Cabs

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