Rahul Vohra was 27 when the stress of running his first startup pushed his health to a breaking point. The Indian-origin entrepreneur collapsed from stress outside a McDonald’s in San Francisco, then went on to build Superhuman, an email company that reached an $825 million valuation, The Times of India reported, citing an interview with Fortune.
At the time of his collapse, Vohra’s first company, Rapportive, was on its way to being acquired by LinkedIn. Behind that success, he was struggling with stress, poor eating habits and a lack of exercise.
How the Indian-Origin Entrepreneur Collapsed
Vohra co-founded Rapportive in 2009, creating a browser plug-in and email service. The startup went through Y Combinator, and in February 2012 LinkedIn acquired it in a deal reportedly valued at $15 million.
Months before the deal, Vohra woke around 3 a.m. with severe nausea and discomfort. He tried to keep to his routine, but by lunchtime the pain was unbearable, and he collapsed while walking to a pharmacy near his office.
A co-founder brought him painkillers. Vohra admits that, “like an idiot,” he went straight back to work, he told Fortune. He went to the hospital the next day.
Doctors diagnosed gastrointestinal reflux disease, according to Fortune, with years of stress, poor diet and lack of exercise contributing. A nurse reportedly told him his insides appeared to belong to someone 10 to 20 years older and advised him to “re-examine” his life.
A Different Way to Build a Company
After the Indian-origin entrepreneur collapsed, he spent time recovering with his family and began questioning the idea that extreme hours are simply part of being a founder.
“I personally find it sad and dismaying when founders in their 20s…[are] running themselves into the ground, often much worse than what I did,” Vohra said. “I hope that when people read this, they see that there is another path.”
He took up transcendental meditation under wellness coach Laurent Valosek, changed his diet, added exercise and protected time away from work. Vohra said the practice changed how he handled investor pressure.
“When I did finally get back into work, all of the games that the VCs were playing…that were really getting to me, just suddenly didn’t faze me at all,” he said.
His story stands out because the Indian-origin entrepreneur collapsed just as his company was close to a successful exit. Vohra said the change gave him “this new source of grit and resilience,” describing a “newfound source of strength, which was simply this gratitude for being alive.”
Building Superhuman After the Indian-Origin Entrepreneur Collapsed
In 2014, Vohra co-founded Superhuman, an email productivity company, with Conrad Irwin and Vivek Sodera. The company raised more than $100 million from investors and reached an $825 million valuation in 2021. Grammarly acquired Superhuman in 2025 for an undisclosed amount.
Vohra said the second journey was different because he had changed both his lifestyle and his perspective. He worked on his diet with professional guidance, kept an exercise routine and made meditation part of his schedule.
Vohra said the sale carried “no existential dread” this time. “We weren’t running out of money. We were growing faster than ever,” he said, adding that the decision was about whether the companies could achieve their mission faster together.
Scaling a company without burning out is a recurring theme for founders, as our interview with Greg Kish on scaling what used to work explores. Product leaders face similar choices, discussed in our piece on building the systems behind multi-billion dollar SaaS products.
For Vohra, the lesson from the day the Indian-origin entrepreneur collapsed was not to stop being ambitious but to build that ambition around a healthier life. Young founders chasing big goals, like the teen in our story who spent a decade raising over one million dollars, may find his advice useful.