Apple’s new campaign shows how students in India are building startups on Mac

It’s 2026, and students are no longer just, well, students. They’re creators, founders, influencers, and a lot more. And Apple India, through its latest ‘Mac for Students’ campaign, is talking about just that. The Cupertino-based tech giant has just rolled out three new videos on its official YouTube channel for India, and when you look at them closely, they all say the same thing: Great ideas start on Mac. So what exactly is the campaign all about, and how does it stand out? Let’s take a look. 

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About Apple’s Mac for Students campaign

Apple’s ‘Great ideas start on a Mac’ is a global campaign that has been around for a while now, but this time, Indian students, who are also entrepreneurs, are in the spotlight. 

And almost all of these young founders have one thing in common, which is that they rely heavily on MacBooks. The MacBook Air and MacBook Pro sit at the centre of the campaign, and are capable of handling demanding workflows that now go far beyond assignments and presentations for students. 

The latest MacBook Air with the M5 chip comes with some serious AI power, Wi-Fi 7 support, and 512GB of starting storage. Apple is also focusing heavily on battery life, which continues to be one of the biggest selling points for students who need reliable endurance on their laptops. As for the MacBook Pro, it is known to be the perfect fit for those who are handling heavier creative workloads.

With that, let’s now meet the students who are a part of this campaign and take a look at their stories. 

Meet the students

One of the students featured in the campaign is a 21-year-old, Gaurav Kukreja, who built a fully functional medical emergency app called Fast Aid in just 13 days. He begins the video by saying, ‘Unpopular opinion: but it’s way better to start when you are bad at something than wait until you’re good.’ 

Then, he shares how he barely had 13 days to build his app. This was when he did not even have a desk in his dorm room, or knew how to code. But he tackled it all by taking up one problem at a time.  Gaurav later became a Distinguished Winner in Apple’s 2025 Swift Student Challenge and even presented his app to Apple CEO Tim Cook.

20-year-old Ananya Kulshrestha’s story is also similar. The founder of Mellovia shared how she balances her college life along with building the sustainable kitchenware brand. The video focuses on the messy reality of trying new things as a student instead of chasing perfection from day one.

Then there is Kabeer Malhotra. The Flowpay founder, who believes that ‘focusing on just one thing is overrated’. Through his video, he explains how he has to don several hats while running his startup and being a student at the same time. 

Some days he is coding and testing his payment app, while on other days, he is simply trying to finish his microeconomics homework on time. That balance between ambition and everyday student chaos gives the video campaign a much more grounded and relatable feel.

What makes the Mac for Students campaign different

We see brands running campaigns all the time. But to me, Apple’s Mac for Students campaign feels super relevant as it comes at a time when India is going through a phase where students are trying to do much more than simply attend classes. 20-year-olds are building some amazing products from college campuses and hostel rooms, some are launching apps or online businesses, and they are doing all of this, even before graduating. 

And again, Apple’s campaign is focusing on this shift through the stories of its featured student founders. Another factor why this campaign sounds different is how it isn’t glamorising the startup life. Yes, it shows the Mac as a valuable gadget in a student’s life, but it also focuses on the chaos and struggles that often stay behind the scenes. 

And this makes it all feel relatable for younger audiences who are already experimenting with side hustles, content creation, or other things.

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