Aman Sanger has become a household name in the field of generative AI. The 25-year-old is one of four MIT graduates who co-founded Anysphere, the company that developed Cursor, a fast-growing AI coding tool. In just a few years, Mr. Sanger has grown from a university programmer to one of the youngest figures in global AI innovation with an estimated net worth of over $1 billion.
Sanger started coding at the age of 14. His early interest in programming and artificial intelligence led him down a path as an entrepreneur.
At MIT, I met Anysphere’s other co-founders: Michael Truell, Sueleh Asif, and Arvid Lunnemark. The four started the company in 2022 with a focus on solving a problem they understood well.
This team is known for its strong technical background. Mr. Sanger and Mr. Tuell were both selected by Neo Scholars, a program that identifies promising technology talent and connects them with Silicon Valley’s leading founders and investors.
Neo subsequently led Cursor’s first funding round and continues to support the company.
First, the group looked at building AI tools for computer-aided design.
They quickly pivoted and chose software engineering, a field they had worked in for years. This decision led to the birth of Cursor, an AI-powered code editor that has since gained global attention.
Cursor introduced the idea of ”vibe coding,” which allows developers to write, edit, and debug large portions of their code using natural language prompts. This approach is so popular that Collins Dictionary chose “vibe coding” as its 2025 word of the year.
Sanger and his team began building Cursor in early 2023. Early versions did not receive much attention.
The team responded by experimenting quickly and releasing even half-baked features. This included Command K functionality for directed editing and codebase indexing.
These updates have allowed Cursor to grow rapidly and attract more developers to the platform. Sanger said much of the work involves “experimenting with what’s possible” and finding new ways to use AI models for programming.
The company’s growth is one of the fastest in the industry. In late 2025, Anysphere was valued at approximately $29.3 billion after a large funding round. Each co-founder is estimated to hold 4.5% of the shares, valued at at least $1.3 billion.
“Software engineering bandwidth and genius ideas are the bottlenecks for rapid advances in AI. Cursor is our attempt to solve the former, so we can devote more talent, effort, and resources to the latter.”
Sanger sees Cursor as part of a larger effort to accelerate advances in artificial intelligence. He says the main barrier is not just technology, but the limited bandwidth of human programmers.
The company also reached $100 million in annual recurring revenue in about a year.
– end
