Hyderabad-born Soumith Chintala, who was rejected by 27 universities and several employers, went on to help build PyTorch, lead Meta AI projects, and become Chief Technology Officer at Thinking Machines Lab. After receiving 27 university rejections while applying for higher studies in the United States, Chintala earned admission to New York University, where he trained under artificial intelligence researcher Yann LeCun, a pioneer of deep learning. Chintala grew up in Hyderabad in a household without a computer, with his first exposure to one occurring at a neighbour's home. He attended Hyderabad Public School and completed his Bachelor of Technology degree at VIT Vellore in 2009. Despite not graduating from an IIT or NIT, he pursued higher education overseas. His career has gained renewed attention as an example of how persistence and technical expertise can outweigh early setbacks.