Aug 11, 2026 · 20m · top-founders
How He Bootstrapped Dental Software to $16m
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
In this interview with Nathan Latka, Practice by Numbers co-founder Rohit Garg explains how he bootstrapped a dental practice management and analytics SaaS from custom SQL spreadsheets into a profitable, $16.5 million ARR platform.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. Nathan holds 28.2% of the talking time here. How this is scored →
Nathan as informed peer 5.4 Guest teaching 2.7 Guest disagreement 1.3 Nathan pushing back 2.3
speaking balance: gold is Nathan, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 11:51 Pushing back against buying revenue
Garg forcefully rejects Latka's premise that their growth is too slow, emphasizing their zero-outside-capital philosophy and refusing to compromise margins just to buy vanity revenue.
Hardest push from Nathan ▶ 11:51 Latka critiques single-digit absolute growth rateLatka openly challenges Garg on why a company with strong product-market fit and a killer niche is only growing from $12.5M to $16.5M.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 14:21 Explaining DSO failure versus outcome-based softwareGarg dismantles Latka's thesis of acquiring physical dental practices by explaining how Dental Support Organizations folded doing that, advocating instead for outcome-based revenue share software.
Nathan holds their own ▶ 10:17 Latka calculates ARR on the flyLatka takes Garg's raw inputs of 1,300 customers and $13,000 ACV to immediately deduce an accurate run rate of $16M ARR before the guest states it.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | Nathan as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | Nathan pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Solving Practice Management and Data Challenges for Dentists | 4 | 3 | 1 | 1 | Latka inquires about the product origins and integration architecture. Garg explains how their software sits on top of practice management systems like Dentrix and Open Dental similarly to medical software sitting on Epic. | |
| Expanding from Analytics to an All-in-One Platform | 5 | 3 | 1 | 2 | Latka challenges Garg on why legacy platforms like Dentrix wouldn't simply build these features with AI. Garg explains how Practice by Numbers captures the fragmented white space around core PMS software much faster than incumbents. | |
| Integration Ecosystem, Pricing Tiers, and ACV | 7 | 4 | 2 | 4 | Latka scrutinizes the integration page for only listing five partners and calculates hypothetical enterprise contract values. Garg corrects the math on top-customer spend and explains GMV dynamics between card payments and insurance. | |
| Historical Growth Trajectory and Reaching $16.5M ARR | 7 | 2 | 1 | 2 | Latka rapidly calculates the company's ARR on the fly from customer counts and average contract values, then maps out their annual revenue trajectory since 2018. | |
| Bootstrapped Philosophy, Profitability, and Organic Growth | 7 | 5 | 3 | 5 | Latka presses Garg on why growth is modest going from $12.5M to $16.5M and suggests acquiring physical practices. Garg firmly defends bootstrapped profitability over buying revenue and explains why the physical DSO rollout strategy fails. | |
| Engineering Team Structure and Defending Against AI Competitors | 6 | 2 | 1 | 2 | Latka probes the engineering allocation toward agentic AI and presents a concrete buyout scenario from Henry Schein. Garg details how co-founders weigh acquisition offers against unfinished vision. | |
| Interview Conclusion and Where to Find Practice by Numbers | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Latka summarizes the company's financial figures and wraps up the interview smoothly with guest contact info. |
Statements from this episode (16)
Garg: Dentistry is a massively undertapped market for software and tech
“Dentistry is such a massively under tapped market in terms of technology and software.”
Garg: Practice by Numbers operates on top of Dentrix and Open Dental
“In the case of dentistry, we set on top of Dentrix or Open Dental, like equivalent to what it would be for medical.”
Garg: Practice by Numbers customers generate 2x national average revenue
“Our customers are almost two X of national average, right? In terms of the volume of the of the production that they do.”
Garg: Legacy dental software incumbents lack technical talent to build fast
“They just can't move at the speed at which we can move. They don't have the technical skills or even the people to be able to build software the way we can.”
Garg: Practice by Numbers averages $12k to $13k ACV per location
“So at this point, we are reaching about 12, 13,000 dollars and that's the average.”
Garg: Practice by Numbers' largest customer pays around $250,000 annually
“Our largest customer is about 250,000 because they don't have all the features, right?”
Garg: Practice by Numbers processes about $190 million in payments GMV
“So we just launched the payments process. Product last year. So the GMV that we have is about hundred and ninety million dollars.”
Garg: Practice by Numbers covers 2,000 locations and 5,000 to 6,000 providers
“That represents about 2000 locations and about five, 6000 providers.”
Garg: Practice by Numbers will finish 2026 at roughly $16.5M ARR
“We will end the year at about 16 and a half.”
Garg: Practice by Numbers is completely bootstrapped with zero outside capital
“First of all, remember we are bootstrapped completely. So there's, well, congrats. That's awesome. Yes. Thank you. And there's not a single dollar that's been taken.”
Garg: Practice by Numbers targets 35% to 40% growth at Rule of 70-80
“We're looking at 35, 40% growth. So we're making a rule of seventy-eighty company.”
Garg: Practice by Numbers sales are driven almost entirely by word of mouth
“And also all of our Sales are inbound, right? Meaning it's all word of mouth. We go to some shows, shows produce a little bit for us, but almost everything is people telling other people.”
Garg: Practice by Numbers generated 22-24% EBITDA and $1.5M FCF in 2025
“2025, we were at about EBITDA was about 20 four, 22, 23 or 24. So we haven't really fully closed the books yet, but there was a free cash flow of about 1.5 last year.”
Garg: Practice by Numbers employs 80 people, including 17 software developers
“So we have about 80 people worldwide, and about 42, 43 of them are in the US, and the rest of them are in India, and engineering-wise, we have about 1817, 18 developers, and at least three or four of them are thinking about agentic workflows.”