Pankaj Kumar founded My Engineering Buddy in 2011, building on My Physics Buddy, which he started in 2008. He has been an educator since 2006 and is a subject expert in Physics, Calculus, and core Mechanical Engineering.
Pankaj trained as a marine engineer at MERI Kolkata, graduated in 2004, and worked as a 4th Engineer on oil tankers before a kidney condition — nephrotic syndrome, diagnosed in 2007 — forced him to leave the merchant navy. After a period of recovery, he joined Tutorvista in 2009 as an online physics tutor, which gave him the flexibility to work from home while managing his health.
In 2011, with encouragement and co-founding support from Anthony Khoury — one of his students from Canada — he launched My Physics Buddy as an independent platform. The early months were difficult enough that he took a parallel role teaching at JEE preparation classes in Patna while building the platform. By February 2011, My Physics Buddy had enough momentum that he could focus on it entirely.
The expansion into all engineering subjects, and eventually into 2,800+ subjects across disciplines, followed naturally from student demand. In August 2011, My Physics Buddy was renamed My Engineering Buddy to reflect this broader scope. MEB has since served 52,000+ students with a team of 1,000+ verified tutors.
Pankaj’s driving belief — that access to a genuinely excellent tutor changes outcomes, and that most students lack that access — shapes every structural decision at MEB, from the human-only matching process to the refusal to use bots in student interactions.
“I have seen very closely how much students struggle to find a good tutor. When I was a student myself, I badly missed an excellent tutor. Solving this problem is the ultimate goal of my life.”