What is Real Problem AI?

Real Problem AI is a curated directory of 100 real problems worth building an AI startup around. Each problem is scored honestly on severity, AI feasibility, market signal, and competition gap. We're for builders looking for what to build, not for ethics debates about AI.

What is the difference between Real Problem AI and AI ethics or AI risks indexes?

Real Problem AI catalogues problems AI can solve — productive, commercial opportunities for builders. AI ethics indexes catalogue problems with AI itself (bias, environmental cost, copyright, consciousness). Different intent, different audience: founders and indie hackers vs researchers and policy folks.

What should I build with AI in 2026?

Look for problems with high severity (it costs people hours, sleep, or revenue every week), high AI feasibility (LLMs, vision or voice are great at this today), strong market signal (Reddit threads + willingness to pay), and a clear competition gap (incumbents miss the same obvious thing). Real Problem AI scores 100 such problems for you on those four axes.

Where do Real Problem AI's startup ideas come from?

From three sources, scanned each cycle: 1) Reddit threads where people describe a real friction in their own words, 2) podcasts and talks of founders young builders trust (Nikhil Kamath, Aman Gupta, Ankur Warikoo, Raj Shamani, Andrej Karpathy, Greg Isenberg), and 3) a continuous 1,000+ source scan covering forums, app store reviews, regulator filings, and field interviews.

Is Real Problem AI free?

Yes. Browsing every problem, opening every score breakdown, raising your hand on a co-founder match, and the founder vault are all free. There is no paywall.

How is each problem scored?

Four axes, each 1-10, weighted: Problem Severity (30%), AI Feasibility (25%), Market Signal (25%), Competition Gap (20%). Weighted average is the Opportunity Score on each card. Only problems clearing 7.0+ make the live list.

Why does India's Section 194T (1% TDS on partner remuneration) still need a CA every month?

Section 194T (effective FY2025-26) forces every Indian LLP and partnership firm to deduct 1% TDS on partner salary, interest, and bonus, file quarterly returns, issue Form 16A, accounting tools don't automate it and CAs charge ₹5-15K/month to manually compute.

Category: FinTech · Trend: Agents · Opportunity score: 8.4 / 10

What is the “Why does India's Section 194T (1% TDS on partner remuneration) still need a CA every month?” problem in 2026?

Who has this problem?

Indian LLP/partnership founders, small-firm CAs, D2C founders running co-founded entities.

Evidence this problem is real

“Two founders, one LLP, three transactions a month. CA bills ₹12,000 monthly just to file 194T returns. The actual computation is a spreadsheet.”

Sourced from ICAI circulars, LinkedIn CA Discord threads (FY26 compliance season), r/IndianStartups, r/CharteredAccountants.

Existing players in this space

ClearTax — Salary TDS yes; 194T partner-remuneration TDS not first-class
Zoho Books — Manual journal entries; no auto-compute and Form 26Q linkage
TallyPrime — Desktop, requires CA literacy

What existing players are missing

An agentic compliance tool: plug into the partnership bank account, classify partner-vs-vendor payments, compute 194T automatically, file Form 26Q quarterly, issue Form 16A, all without a CA. Targets India's ~600K active LLPs and partnerships.

How Real Problem AI scores this opportunity

Aggregate score: 8.4 / 10. Four-axis rubric:

Problem severity: 8 / 10
AI feasibility today: 9 / 10
Market signal: 8 / 10
Competition gap: 9 / 10

How to build a solution: stack hints

Bank/UPI transaction classifier (LLM + rule fallback)
Quarterly Form 26Q e-filing via TRACES API
Form 16A PDF generator
DPDP-compliant data handling for partner PII