Just like binary numbers (0 and 1) form the foundation of computer systems and digital information, the fundamentals of the world of biotechnology are based on genetic codes — A, T, C and G. 

With permutations and combinations of these codes and programming and reprogramming, scientists have been able to modify the DNA of plants, animals, microbes, and even insects to address various challenges in medical science and find new avenues in various industrial use cases. 

For example, researchers at the University of Oxford are working on producing green hydrogen by bioengineering bacteria. Similarly, bioengineered bacteria are also being used to break down toxic compounds, including plastic waste, and produce biofuels as an alternative to fossil fuels. And we have barely scratched the surface here. 

In these, precision fermentation often plays a key role. This specialised technology uses genetically engineering microbes with specific traits to produce targeted proteins, enzymes or bio-compounds that are further helpful in the manufacturing of biofuels, bio-materials, and specialised chemicals.

In India, Bengaluru-based Fermbox Bio is using precision fermentation and synthetic biology to programme microorganisms and produce bio-based enzymes and technologies to produce biofuels and manufacture cosmetics and industrial dyes for textile use.

Competing with global giants such as Novozymes and chemical companies like DuPont and BASF, which are also working on building bio-based materials, Fermbox Bio is part of the global precision fermentation market opportunity that is expected to grow to $57.01 Bn by 2032.

Building From India For The World

Fermbox Bio’s founder and MD Subramani Ramachandrappa started his entrepreneurial journey by founding Richcore Lifesciences in 2000, which was later acquired by Laurus Labs (now known as Laurus Bio). 

With Ramachandrappa at the helm, Richcore made several advancements in producing sulfur-free white sugar, treating industrial wastewater, reducing sugar loss during molasses storage, and minimising chemical use in processes like leather and grain processing.

With over two decades of experience building Richcore and working with Biocon, Ramachandrappa cofounded Fermbox Bio in 2022 with Preeti Dharmagoudar, who also brings more than 20 years of experience in building businesses at companies like Abbott Nutrition and Biocon.

“Fermbox Bio was set up after I realised that biotech needs to change and become more collaborative,” Ramachandrappa said.

“Computers have access to tech from hundreds of companies, but in biotech, we don’t have access to such large datasets. Thus, we try to do everything in-house and it takes much longer that way. So, at Fermbox, we are building a global collaborative model for biotech, the first of its kind,” he added.

Fermbox Bio functions as a biofoundry and a large-scale manufacturing startup of synthetic bioproducts. By replacing plants, animals and harsh chemicals for various industrial applications, the startup aims to build sustainable alternatives to traditional colours and dyes, flavours and fragrances, and fuel using microorganisms.

Currently, the company has developed three products — EN3ZYME, which is already commercialised, and Synbio-Indigo and Bio-hexenol, which are yet to be commercially launched.

Fermbox works in an asset-light business model and has raised $2.5 Mn so far to build its tech capabilities. The startup is backed by the likes of Speciale Invest and 3one4 Capital, among others.

Unison Of Rich Tech Capabilities & Strong Business Model

Fermbox Bio’s biofoundry in India is where gene-modified microbes are designed. Further, partnerships with larger companies have helped it scale production for commercial use. 

The startup has already entered a partnership with Thailand-based BBGI to establish an $80 Mn precision fermentation facility in Thailand.

Ramachandrappa said that synthetic bio companies fail in two main areas — developing cost-effective products and building a plant.

“We have passed these two and are clear about what we want to scale. That makes us very potent as a growth-poised company. We modify the gene, put it in a host, and ferment it. Although this has been happening for 60 years, the key is to select the right product. We are not operating in the biopharma space because this segment is crowded and has hoards of the whole regulatory process. We are targeting areas that can help scale both biopharma and food,” he said.

For instance, he said that lanolin from Vitamin D3 commonly comes from the wool of the sheep. However, with Fermbox’s technology, this base material for producing Vitamin D3 can be done without exploiting the animal, which makes it a vegan, more sustainable and scalable source of the vitamin.

India has been highlighting the importance of biofuel since 2018. In the National Policy of Biofuels 2018, the country has also set a target of 20% ethanol blending in petrol and 5% biodiesel blending in diesel by 2030. In 2020, the ethanol blending target was advanced to 2025. 

As a major step towards building biofuels, Fermbox has developed a cellulosic enzyme cocktail, EN3ZYME, designed for the efficient conversion of pre-treated biomass (agricultural waste) into fermentable sugars. These sugars are then fermented into ethanol.

The startup claims to be the only Indian company to be able to develop this enzyme, solving a major cost challenge for the Indian government and energy companies working on bioethanol.

Fermbox Bio intends to onboard at least three customers and is targeting INR 500 Cr in revenue in the next two to three years. Its facility in Thailand, which is becoming operational soon, will have 4 Lakh litres of production capacity of EN3ZYME.

“Our idea is to create a use case, show big companies the margins, and then build facilities in Eastern Europe, India, Africa, and wherever there’s sugar and waterbodies around,” the founder said.

In terms of revenue, Fermbox Bio is aiming to clock $3 Mn in revenue in its first full year of operations, FY25. It eyes $10 Mn in revenue by FY26.

The startup also provides services to companies developing other products, such as dairy, using precision fermentation.

What’s Next For Fermbox  

Fermbox Bio’s plan is to double down on engaging with its potential customers this year, given its facility is almost up and running.

Besides, the startup is also working on developing a sustainable alternative to traditionally produced indigo dye, which can be used in textile and personal care products and as a sustainable alternative to cis-3-hexenol (aka leaf alcohol due to its strong odour of freshly cut grass), which is traditionally produced by cutting pine trees or grasses used in cosmetics, food, flavour, and fragrances.

In the next one year, Fermbox Bio wants to launch cis-3-hexenol commercially and onboard at least two to three customers. After building a strong R&D capability based in India, the startup also wants to strengthen its R&D capability in the US where it recently set up a subsidiary.

The company is also in the process of raising $15 Mn in its Series A funding round to scale its R&D capabilities and product development. 

Meanwhile, though opportunities are aplenty, scaling the business could be a challenge, especially in the presence of giants like Novozymes. On the other hand, the Indian government’s policy support is also limited.

Though there are intentions and discussions around building biomanufacturing and biofoundries in India, the government last year approved INR 9,197 Cr towards the same. However, according to Ramachandrappa, this amount can only do little and the outlay must be expanded along with its allocation.

“The government has just started supporting biomanufacturing, but the quantum of funding needs to be improved if we want to compete with the US or China. Besides, the policymakers have to understand that biotech is a strategic long-term investment in our efforts to prepare for any unexpected shock, such as the Covid-19 pandemic, in the near future,” he added.

With that, it now remains to be seen if Fermbox Bio can scale its business in India and globally to help cut down on the use of harmful chemicals and animal and plant slaughter in making industrial products and processes more ecofriendly.

[Edited By Shishir Parasher]

The post Is Fermbox Bio India’s Answer To A Biofuels-Led Future? appeared first on Inc42 Media.

New-age tech stocks continued to struggle on the Indian bourses and witnessed a mixed week as the broader domestic market registered another week of losses. 

While some of these stocks saw a slight recovery this week, the total market cap of the 31 new-age tech stocks under Inc42’s coverage declined to $87.89 Bn from $88.38 Bn last week.

Of the 31 stocks, 16 fell this week in a range of 0.1% to a little over 14%. MobiKwik, which declined 8.4% last week, emerged as the biggest loser this week. 

The fintech major’s shares plunged almost 14.2% to INR 471.25 on the BSE. On Friday, the company said it has partnered Piramal Finance to offer personal loans of up to INR 2 Lakh to customers.

FirstCry was the second-biggest loser of the week, with its shares nosediving almost 10%. Shares of PB Fintech also fell 7%, followed by Fino Payments Bank’s 6.5% decline.

Among the other big losers were ixigo, Swiggy, CarTrade Technology, TBO Tek, and EaseMyTrip. 

Earlier this week, Swiggy said that it has received the corporate affairs ministry’s nod to incorporate a sports subsidiary, Swiggy Sports Pvt Ltd. 

Meanwhile, shares of TAC Infosec rallied 10.4% this week to emerge as the top gainer this week. Nazara Technologies was the second biggest gainer, with its shares rallying 6.8%. 

The gaming major’s board approved allotment of shares worth over INR 195 Cr this week via a preferential issue pertaining to its acquisition of a 47.7% stake in Moonshine Technology, the parent of Pokerbaazi. The company’s board is also scheduled to consider issuance of equity shares on a preferential basis on Monday (January 20).

Fintech major Paytm was the third-biggest gainer this week, with its shares jumping 6.2%. BlackBuck, Zomato, Go Digit, Mamaearth, Tracxn Technologies, Delhivery, and Ola Electric were among the other stocks which ended in the green this week.

Zomato was in the news for multiple reasons this week. It infused INR 500 Cr in its quick commerce arm Blinkit, and leased an over 2.5 Lakh square feet warehouse near Mumbai for its B2B supply chain arm Hyperpure. Brokerage JM Financial also reiterated its ‘buy’ rating on the foodtech major with a price target of INR 300.

Meanwhile, volatility continued in the broader market this week. Benchmark indices Nifty 50 fell 1% and Sensex declined 0.98%, ending Friday’s trading at 23,203.2 and 76,619.33, respectively. 

Commenting on the broader market trends, Vinod Nair, head of research at Geojit Financial Services, said that the domestic market ended on a weak note, with large cap IT and banking stocks seeing higher underperformance due to a cautious outlook on discretionary spending for the former and subdued deposit and credit growth and tighter liquidity conditions for the latter. 

“Rising uncertainty over potential economic policies from the new US administration impacted overall sentiments… the market is expected to remain cautious in the short term due to moderate Q3 expectations, while persistent FII outflows could add to higher volatility,” said Nair. 

With the Donald Trump administration taking over in the US next week, the forthcoming policies and comments will also be watched, given tariffs remain a major focus, as per market analysts.

Siddhartha Khemka, head of research, wealth management at Motilal Oswal, said that the domestic equities market is expected to remain volatile and stock-specific actions are expected with Q3 FY25 earnings in full swing. 

Two major new-age tech stocks, Zomato and Paytm, are scheduled to post their Q3 earnings next week.

The new-age tech stocks have lost more than $10 Bn in total market cap in January so far. 

Paytm Zooms On Potential Re-Entry In MSCI Index

Reversing its 14% decline last week, shares of Paytm gained 6.2% this week. The stock ended Friday’s trading at INR 899.65 on the BSE.

The stock started gaining momentum on Tuesday after brokerage JM Financial predicted in a research note that there is a high possibility of the inclusion of Paytm in the MSCI India Standard Index.

The brokerage said it foresees a capital inflow of $169 Mn for the Vijay Shekhar Sharma-led company.

Post that, shares of Paytm gained in all three next trading sessions this week. 

Meanwhile, Paytm’s current and former directors and officials settled a case with SEBI by paying a sum of INR 3.32 Cr. 

Paytm also expanded its ESOP pool this week by granting 2.03 Lakh stock options under its ESOP Plan 2019.

PB Fintech Takes A Hit

Shares of PB Fintech hit a two-month low this week amid concerns about its high valuation and a raid by GST officials on one of its subsidiaries.

The stock touched its all-time high, breaching the INR 2,000 level, in the first week of January. However, it has been on a downward trend since then. 

After falling more than 16% last week, PB Fintech’s shares slumped 7% this week. The stock ended Friday’s trading at INR 1,725.55 on the BSE.

It hit the INR 1,600 level earlier this week, the lowest since November 13 last year.

Recently, Morgan Stanley downgraded PB Fintech to an ‘underweight’ rating from ‘equal-weight’ earlier, citing lower-than-expected profit and high stock valuations. The brokerage also cut the price target to INR 1,400, which implies an almost 19% downside to the stock’s last close.

Meanwhile, PB Fintech said in an exchange filing this week that the GST department conducted a raid on one of its wholly-owned subsidiaries. Sources told Inc42 that the raid was in relation to PB Partners, the fintech major’s platform for insurance agents.

The company is being investigated for alleged tax evasion of about INR 80 Cr-INR 90 Cr, as per the sources.

The post New-Age Tech Stocks See Mixed Performance This Week, MobiKwik Biggest Loser appeared first on Inc42 Media.

SoftBank-backed adtech unicorn InMobi is looking to file its draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) in the next two to three months for its initial public offering (IPO) of more than $1 Bn.

Sources told Inc42 that the company is eyeing a public listing by October this year. InMobi is targeting a valuation of $8 Bn to $10 Bn for the IPO.

The IPO will comprise a fresh issue of shares as well as an offer for sale (OFS) component. However, the IPO size is yet to be finalised, given discussions with bankers are still on. 

InMobi declined to comment on Inc42’s queries on its IPO plans. 

It is pertinent to note that it was reported in July last year that the unicorn was looking at an IPO in 2025 at a valuation of $10 Bn, which was said to be one of the biggest listings by an Indian software startup.

Among the new-age tech companies, Paytm sought the highest valuation of $20 Bn for its IPO in 2021. Last year, foodtech major Swiggy went public at a valuation of over $11 Bn.

InMobi’s IPO is also expected to be one of the largest public offerings by a new-age tech company in 2025. As per various media reports, startups like Lenskart, OfBusiness, Zetwerk, and Pine Labs are also eyeing raising around $1 Bn each from their IPOs this year.

Founded in 2007 by Naveen Tewari, Piyush Shah, Mohit Saxena, and Abhay Singhal, InMobi provides marketing and monetisation solutions to brands, advertisers, and publishers. In 2019, it diversified its business with the launch of Glance, an AI-based unicorn that operates an Android lockscreen platform.

Currently, InMobi is in the process of shifting its domicile to India from Singapore. 

One of the sources said that InMobi is seeking a high valuation for the IPO as it includes the valuation of the parent company as well as its majority stake (around 60%) in the consumer tech platform Glance. 

However, InMobi has separate IPO plans for Glance. The Google-backed startup will take a few more years to get listed on the bourses as a separate entity after it raises one or two rounds of private funding.

InMobi is also betting big on generative AI (GenAI) to drive growth in its adtech business. It aims to be the first GenAI application startup to be listed on the Indian bourses. 

The company’s founder and CEO Tewari told ET recently that InMobi’s GenAI stack is being built in-house, leveraging Google’s Gemini as the foundational model.

Last year, InMobi also secured a $100 Mn debt funding from Mars Growth Capital, a joint venture between MUFG and Liquidity Group, to strengthen its AI capabilities. 

The unicorn is also looking at potential AI-focussed acquisitions.

Meanwhile, InMobi’s subsidiary Roposo is transitioning to a broader social commerce platform from an influencer-led commerce model, which will allow users to set up their own stores and leverage GenAI tools to sell products online.

It is pertinent to note that InMobi was eyeing an IPO in the US market in 2021. However, the plan was stalled amid the Covid-19 pandemic and the subsequent changes it brought to the global market.

On the financial front, InMobi was earlier said to be looking to clock a revenue of $700 Mn by the end of March 2025. The company currently gets 70-80% of its revenue from North America. 

In FY23, InMobi posted a revenue of $281 Mn as against $275 Mn in the previous year. Its profit declined to $41 Mn from $50 Mn in FY22.

The post Exclusive: InMobi To File Draft Papers For $1 Bn+ IPO By April appeared first on Inc42 Media.

India’s AI ecosystem has undergone a major shift in the last few years, especially with the advent of GenAI. The rapid evolution of this space has not only sparked innovation across industries but also raised pressing concerns about the ethical implications of the use of AI.  

Therefore, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) recently introduced AI governance guidelines as part of its ambitious INR 10,371.92 Cr IndiaAI Mission. 

Under the IndiaAI Mission, the Centre has formed an advisory group, chaired by the principal scientific advisor, to undertake the development of an ‘AI for India-Specific Regulatory Framework’. 

Under the groups’ guidance, a subcommittee on ‘AI Governance and Guidelines Development’ has been asked to provide recommendations for AI governance in India. 

Currently open for consultation, the report has called for transparency, accountability, deployment of a “fair and inclusive” AI system, and the importance of human oversight, among others.

Meanwhile, industry stakeholders Inc42 spoke with seemed cautiously optimistic. While some worry that impending regulations could stifle growth, many see these guidelines as essential for fostering innovation.

Now, before we delve deeper, let’s take a look at the recommendations:

• MeitY and the principal scientific adviser have been tasked to establish a mechanism to coordinate AI governance across sectors.
• A technical secretariat is to be established to serve as a technical advisory body and coordination focal point.
• The technical secretariat should also establish, house, and operate an AI incident database as a repository of problems experienced in the real world that should guide responses to mitigate or avoid repeated bad outcomes.
• To enhance transparency and governance across the AI ecosystem, the technical secretariat should engage the industry to drive voluntary commitments on transparency across the overall AI ecosystem.
• The technical secretariat should examine the suitability of technological measures to address AI-related risks.
• Recommendations are in place to form a sub-group to work with MeitY to suggest specific measures that may be considered under the proposed legislation like the Digital India Act (DIA) to strengthen and harmonise the legal framework.

What’s The Need?

In the AI governance guidelines report, MeitY said, “AI refers to a range of technologies which can be used for both harm and good. Governing the use of AI is driven by the need to minimise risks and harms.” 

The report also touches upon the challenges associated with governing AI. For instance, it notes that it can be difficult to understand how different components within an AI system interact with each other and which specific component is responsible for any potential harm caused. 

Building upon the various AI governance guidelines designed and suggested in India since 2016 by agencies, including NITI Aayog and Nasscom, MeitY has further proposed a list of AI governance principles in the report. 

These principles have stressed the need for transparency, accountability, fairness and non-discrimination, and inclusive and sustainable innovation, among others.

Jaspreet Bindra, CEO of AI&Beyond, sees these guidelines as a framework for enterprises to align with ethical AI practices while navigating India’s socio-economic context. However, the absence of robust laws leaves challenges like deepfakes unaddressed.

Last year’s general elections highlighted these risks, with AI-generated content spreading misinformation on social media. The report stresses the need for “digital by design” governance to modernise systems and tackle such issues effectively.

Harsh Walia, partner at Khaitan & Co, notes that the two key expectations of the report are implementing tools to enhance accountability and traceability.

Walia said that these recommendations largely align with existing industry best practices, particularly for entities that already prioritise transparency, safety, and accountability in their AI-related operations. 

As a result, these guidelines are not expected to drastically change the internal policies of these entities, but they highlight the importance of adopting proactive, ethical governance measures that align with India’s evolving AI ecosystem.

He added that the techno-legal approach, as highlighted by the government, offers advantages, including scalability and efficiency, enhanced monitoring capabilities, and risk mitigation.

Notably, India has already seen success with this approach in various sectors. For instance, SEBI employs AI tools for data analysis to improve surveillance and combat money laundering practices. Additionally, telecom service providers use AI-powered filters to detect and block spam calls and messages, protecting consumers from fraudulent activities. 

“Integrating governance technology tools, as envisioned in the report, ensures that governance frameworks are not only robust but also adaptable to emerging challenges,” Walia added.

A Sharp Focus On Copyright Protection

MeitY’s AI governance guidelines have also paid special focus on the perils of training AI models on copyrighted data, which is a major issue that the world is currently grappling with.

It is important to note that in recent years, multiple litigations have been filed by content-producing and publishing companies against top AI companies for training their models on copyrighted works. 

In 2023, the New York Times filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against Microsoft and OpenAI in the US. The bone of contention for the leading global news organisation was OpenAI’s “unlawful use” of its work to create artificial intelligence products. 

Similarly, Getty Images started legal proceedings against Stability AI last year. In addition, comedian Sarah Silverman and a few other authors sued Meta and OpenAI for using their books without permission to train AI models.

According to IndiaAI Mission’s latest report, “Given that the copyright law grants the copyright holder an exclusive right to store, copy etc., creation of datasets using copyrighted works for training foundation models, without the approval of the right holder can lead to infringement.”

However, the report also points out that since copyright protection requires ‘human authorship,’ it is unclear whether works created using foundation models are eligible for copyright under current laws.

“By proactively creating appropriate guidance, the relevant authorities (Copyright Office and the Ministry of Commerce & Industry) can provide certainty and clarity to the users as well as to other government authorities who may otherwise adopt inconsistent practices. A consultation of what would be appropriate guidance to clarify whether and to what extent creative works generated by using foundation models can be eligible for copyright protection might be useful,” the report said.

The Challenges Ahead

From identifying the issues in each stakeholder to keeping the regulations relevant in a fast-evolving ecosystem like AI, the challenges to implementing a regulatory framework around this technology are multifaceted. However, the existing IT laws can help to set a few fundamental grounds to fight against the malicious sides of the tech.

Per the report, there are existing legal safeguards/instruments to protect against the misuse of foundation models for creating malicious synthetic media. 

Depending upon the context and negative effect of the malicious synthetic media in question, multiple laws such as the IT Act, Indian Penal Code (IPC), Prevention of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012, Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015, Digital Personal Data Protection Act (DPDPA), and others can apply.

Khaitan & Co’s Walia said that one of the primary challenges in developing and deploying AI is the risk of compromising user privacy and data confidentiality, which DPDPA addressed by implementing a consent-based model for personal data processing. 

The act’s technology-neutral design makes it applicable to all emerging technologies, including AI-driven innovations, he said.

However, Walia said, “While the report acknowledges that the existing legal framework is adequate, it does not specify the measures needed to enhance its implementation. From a business perspective, although self-regulation is appreciated, businesses would benefit from clearer guidance on the practical application of regulatory norms.”

Meanwhile, the founder and CEO of GenAI startup Avaamo, Ram Menon, believes that while the initiatives by the working committee of the Indian government are noble, trying to mandate how a fast-moving technology like AI is built, created, and implemented is the wrong approach. 

“The guidelines could prove obsolete in a couple of months. The public, however, could be well served if the government focussed on how AI will impact consumers and the public,” Menon added.

He has suggested a more nuanced approach, for instance, how to handle bias in AI models when disbursing loans or other financial products. According to him, the focus should be on controlling and normalising outcomes that affect consumers due to the deployment of AI technology rather than over-regulating its development processes.

Come that as it may, as the country tries to balance innovation and regulation, these guidelines make for the essential initial first steps in ensuring that AI’s transformative potential is harnessed responsibly and sustainably.

[Edited By Shishir Parasher]

The post How MeitY’s Draft AI Guidelines Ensure A Transparent Route Towards Accountable Innovation appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Google-backed spacetech startup Pixxel is set for the launch of the first three hyperspectral imaging satellites of its Firefly constellation aboard a SpaceX rocket from California on Wednesday at midnight India time. 

The launch will be keenly watched in India as besides Pixxel, two more startups – Digantara and XDLINX – will also be reportedly launching their satellites aboard the same rocket.

The launch of Pixxel’s satellites is an important milestone for the country’s burgeoning spacetech industry, as this will be the launch of India’s first private satellite constellation.

The satellites are aimed to be placed at roughly 550 km, orbiting in a sun-synchronous orbit. As per the definition of the European Space Agency, sun-synchronous orbit (SSO) is a kind of polar orbit in which satellites are in sync with the Sun.

In an interaction with Inc42 in July 2023, Pixxel’s founder and CEO Awais Ahmed had said that Firefly is a 24-satellite constellation, of which, the first six would be launched in 2024. However, due to various reasons, the launch was delayed.

To dig deeper into the path to the launch of the first three satellites happening tonight—challenges, significance, market opportunity, and more—we spoke to Ahmed and Pixxel cofounder and CTO Kshitij Khandelwal. 

However, what intrigued us the most is that the Indian spacetech startup chose SpaceX over ISRO. What could be the reason?

Here are the edited excerpts…

Inc42: What is the significance of launching in a sun-synchronous orbit at a 550 km altitude?

Awais Ahmed: Satellites in the sun-synchronous orbit are synchronised with the Sun. In most cases, we hear about geostationary satellites, which are stationary with the Earth. These are mainly communication satellites. If we launch a geo satellite just over India, it’s always over India. It doesn’t change its location with respect to the Earth.

This also means that if I’m taking an image of Bengaluru today at 11 AM, the next time that I will take an image of Bengaluru will also be exactly at 11 AM. Similarly, if I’m taking an image of London, then that’s also going to be around 11 AM. 

So, as the satellite continues to move, its motion is synchronised with the Sun regardless of where it is taking an image. This allows the images to be always uniform, given that lighting conditions remain the same.

However, there is no particular significance of launching the satellite at 550 km altitude.

Inc42: What is the reason behind choosing SpaceX over ISRO for the launch? Also, what are the perks and challenges of working with SpaceX?

Awais Ahmed: The reason for choosing SpaceX was more from a timing point of view. Since our satellites were ready, we wanted to launch them without any delay. 

As mentioned, our satellites have to be at around 550 km altitude because that’s where it is designed for. It needs to be in a sun-synchronous orbit. 

However, ISRO has not had a launch that fits these parameters in the last year and nothing is on the cards for the next three quarters. 

SpaceX was just a convenient choice because our satellites were ready and we didn’t want to wait too long to launch them, which could have also hindered our revenue generation. 

So, the main reason was that SpaceX provided a faster launch window and was also slightly cheaper.

Inc42: Isn’t it costlier to launch with SpaceX given that your satellites are manufactured in India?

Awais Ahmed: Transportation costs make for a tiny fraction of the total programme cost and do not have any significant impact on the budget. 

Waiting for three quarters and delaying revenue generation would have cost us way more than shipping it to the US.

Inc42: How much are you spending on the launch of the first three satellites of the Firefly constellation?

Awais Ahmed: SpaceX charges about $6,500 per kg rideshare for payload. Now, each of our satellites weighs around 60 kg, making it a total payload of 180 kg. This cost involves everything from loading the satellite on the rocket to putting them in orbit.

Inc42: When we spoke in 2023, you were planning to launch these satellites in 2024. What’s the reason behind the delay in the launch?

Awais Ahmed: It’s usually hard to build things that go to space, and we can’t repair things once they are launched. Therefore, we decided to take a few additional months to test the software and hardware, keeping in mind all the contingencies that might come up. 

So, yes, initially, we were supposed to launch it around June or July of 2024, which then got shifted to around November 2024. Then, SpaceX’s launch got delayed by a couple of months. That’s why the launch is happening now in January.

Inc42: You are planning to launch three more Firefly satellites in the next two to three months. Are you expecting any hurdles? Also, could there be any deviation from the plan on January 15?

Kshitij Khandelwal: Obviously, things can go wrong at any time, but generally, we are quite prepared to handle all of them. There are a whole bunch of things that have contingency procedures when it comes to the launch. 

We have three satellites in the office today, three are on the rocket. The idea is that once the first launch happens, we will be shipping the other three satellites to the launch site. 

Then the other hurdle is fuelling the satellites and making sure all the pre-launch checks are done properly. There’s a lens cap on the satellite, we have to remove that as well. Then, after the launch, we need to ensure that we are connected to the satellite to get our images.

We have been working on these missions for more than two years now. So, there’s a lot of work that has already gone in. 

There are a bunch of tests that we have been doing for the last few months. We carried out tests at the launch site. Sometimes it depends on the weather if the launch window is met or not. But based on the current forecast, it’s quite optimistic at the launch site, so it does not look like we’ll have any deviations.

Inc42: How significant is the launch for the Indian spacetech ecosystem?

Kshitij Khandelwal: There are a lot of signs that point to the fact that in the last three to four years, the Indian space ecosystem, especially the private sector in it, has seen very different colours. 

The Indian government has been openly supportive of private companies and the successful launch is emblematic of the effort that has gone into the project in the last two to three years.

For us, it’s the start of a lot of things as a company. Being a company that employs roughly 200 people, it is definitely a moment of pride.

We are quite sure the industry needs such success stories to grow further so that more funding can make its way into the ecosystem, coupled with a more confident government about its spacetech prowess.

Inc42: How significant is the launch for the global market, given that Pixxel has competitors outside India, too?

Awais Ahmed: It is India’s first commercial constellation and also the world’s highest-resolution hyperspectral constellation. So, we are launching the world’s first truly hyperspectral satellite constellation. 

While there are competitors, what separates us is our ability to provide a 5-metre resolution. That is why it is a great moment globally as well when we compete based on the quality of our hyperspectral data. 

The post Why Launch Of Pixxel’s Satellites With SpaceX Is A Turning Point For Indian Spacetech appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Bernstein has initiated coverage on foodtech and quick commerce major Swiggy with an ‘outperform’ rating and a target price (TP) of INR 635, as the brokerage has an optimistic outlook on both quick commerce and food delivery verticals.

The brokerage believes that Swiggy will be one of the winners in India’s “convenience economy” and benefit from the structural shift to super-fast delivery models in the fastest-growing market globally. Bernstein sees quick commerce as an attractive category with a play on the broader retail market. 

“Swiggy is one of the core beneficiaries of the shift. Growth runway remains robust with Swiggy expected to grow 90%+ CAGR in the medium term led by new categories (electronics, apparel) & Tier 2+ cities,” said analysts at Bernstein. They project Instamart to reach adjusted EBITDA breakeven by mid-FY27 and 3-4% by FY30 as scale drives operating leverage.

It is pertinent to note that while the quick commerce segment has been seeing high competitive intensity for some time, the food delivery segment is also seeing an increase in competition, with focus on quick deliveries. As a result, Swiggy recently rolled out a new app ‘SNACC’ to deliver quick bites, beverages and meals in 15 minutes.

However, analysts at Bernstein are not too worried by this. “While competitive intensity is increasing from ecommerce players (Amazon, Flipkart), we expect incumbents (Swiggy, Zomato) to hold market share (in quick commerce). Swiggy has built strong assets (dark stores, brand relationships, delivery rider network) allowing the company to remain ahead of the competition,” the brokerage highlighted.

The analysts also said in the initiation note that the duopoly structure of the food delivery market will continue, and Swiggy is expected to grow its GOV in this vertical at 21% CAGR in the FY25-27 period. 

“While Swiggy’s market share declined by 4% over the last three years, we see market share stabilising (about 42%) with better customer acquisition and innovative product launch (Bolt, Swiggy One Lite),” Bernstein said. 

The brokerage sees the adjusted EBITDA margins in Swiggy’s food delivery expanding to 4% by FY30 from 1.2% in Q2 FY25, in line with Zomato’s margin expansion.

Bernstein’s TP implies a 29.4% upside to Swiggy’s last close on the BSE. Its shares ended Wednesday’s trading session 3.6% lower at INR 490.65.

During its Q2 FY25 earnings announcement, Swiggy said that it expects its business to achieve adjusted EBITDA profitability on a consolidated level in the third quarter of FY26. On the quick commerce front, Swiggy, too, projects adjusted EBITDA break-even by the second quarter of FY27.

Meanwhile, Swiggy also expects its out of home consumption business to achieve adjusted EBITDA break-even in the current fiscal year. Bernstein analysts said in the research note that they expect this vertical to grow at a 22% CAGR between FY25 and FY30.

Swiggy’s consolidated net loss narrowed 4.78% to INR 625.53 Cr in Q2 FY25 from INR 657 Cr in the year-ago quarter. Its operating revenue jumped 30% year-on-year to INR 3,601.45 Cr during the quarter.

Two months back, UBS also initiated coverage on Swiggy with a ‘buy’ rating and TP of INR 515.

Since its listing on the bourses, in early November, Swiggy shares have gained 19% on the BSE.

The post Swiggy Gets Outperform Rating, Target Price Of INR 635 From Bernstein appeared first on Inc42 Media.

The year 2024 was upbeat on the funding front for the Indian semiconductor space. What pushed the envelope last year was robust government support for the sector and a strengthened policy framework.

According to the data compiled by Inc42, at least seven semiconductor startups raised funding worth more than $28 Mn last year, compared to a little over $5 Mn raised by two startups the year before.

Given that India already has top design engineers and a large number of startups in the chip design space, most VC investments flowed into this category last year. Some ventures that kept investors engaged during the year were Mindgrove Technologies, FermionIC, and BigEndian Semiconductors. 

While Mindgrove Technologies topped the funding charts, bagging $8 Mn, FermionIC took the second spot and raised $6 Mn during the year. Further, C2i Semiconductors, AGNIT Semiconductors and BigEndian raised $4 Mn, $3.5 Mn and $3 Mn, respectively, during the year.

Notably, funding raised by gallium nitride (GaN) wafer developer AGNIT Semiconductors and many-core processor developer Morphing Machines ($2.76 Mn) is emblematic of the fact that the Indian semiconductor space is maturing.   

What’s also worth mentioning is that while semiconductor design startups in India have existed for decades, most of them relied on government support or limited private market investment until a few years ago. 

However, this trend is now changing with India becoming a crucible for an increasing number of tech-capable ventures. Not to mention, many fabless semiconductor companies, such as Sankalp Semiconductor, Beceem Communications, and Cosmic Circuits have also been acquired by larger international players over the years.

Apart from the Indian semiconductor industry moving closer to maturity in 2024, several factors boosted venture capital (VC) activity in the sector. Some of these are the establishment of fabrication plants, government initiatives like design or production-linked incentives, and the advantages gained from the China+1 strategy.

Decoding The Funding Equation

Now, before diving into decoding the funding paradigm in the space, it is crucial to understand that semiconductor is a sunrise sector, therefore the amount of funding in the space is currently on a steady pace. 

Other factors that often have a direct bearing on the funding quantum include capex-heavy business models and the development of technologies that have too long gestation time.      

Not to mention, private funds, particularly venture capital, are more interested in fabless semiconductor companies that are into designing chips or creating IPs. This is because such ventures do not need much capital and have a shorter gestation period compared to manufacturing versus corporations engaged in manufacturing. 

Despite this, the fund allocation in terms of ticket size is still far away from being on par with the amount of capital that is required to back chip manufacturers.  

However, the year 2024 paved the way for more hope. Several glimmers of hope emerged with the launch of new funds aimed at serving the sector.

A key example is Yali Capital, an INR 810 Cr fund launched by Ganapathy Subramaniam and Mathew Cyriac. Floated in July last year, the fund invests across deeptech sector and in segments such as chip design, robotics, aerospace and defence, genomics, space, manufacturing, and the wide world of AI.   

Besides, existing deeptech-focussed VCs and other sector-agnostic ones have increased their focus on semiconductors. For instance, growX Ventures floated its second fund with a target corpus of INR 400 Cr with semiconductor startups being a key focus. Similarly, 3one4 Capital made its first semiconductor investment in AGNIT last year.

Interestingly, 20-year-old Morphing Machines raised INR 23 Cr in seed funding last year from deeptech VC firm Speciale Invest, IvyCap Ventures, and others. 

This 2005-founded company received VC attention in recent times its processor, REDEFINE, which is being touted as one of the few many-core processors in the world that integrates various domain-specific architectures (DSAs) on a single chip.

“Over the last many decades in the semiconductor industry, the problem of building multicore, multi-application, reconfigurable compute chips has not been fully solved. This is a massive problem that Morphing Machines has been trying to solve through years of research, and over the last two or three years this research has culminated to being very close to a product in reality,” said Speciale Invest’s Partner Arjun Rao, speaking on the rationale behind investing in the company.

Meanwhile, investors have started showing a lot of interest in startups that are into chip designing, particularly the ones building for artificial intelligence (AI) applications.

According to Rao, activity in specialised chip designing for niche applications with AI is increasing. The ones making for automotive, household devices, and manufacturing will emerge as the winners. Rao added that with AI adoption rising, the demand for AI-enabled data centres will explode. 

“The semiconductor technology for the data centre ecosystem is set to undergo significant innovation. Speciale is particularly excited about advancements in areas such as silicon photonics, optical interconnects, in-memory and flexible compute architecture, analogue AI compute, and more,” Rao said.

The Centre’s Shot In The Arm For Semiconductor Startups

It is to be noted that the Indian government has significantly increased land allocation and funding to Indian and international semiconductor players to set up their fabrication plants. 

At the beginning of 2024, Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated three semiconductor plants worth over INR 1.25 Lakh Cr. 

These factories included CG Power and Renesas Electronics’ INR 7,600 Cr chip project facility, Tata and Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp’s (PSMC) chip foundry worth INR 91,000 Cr, and the Tata OSAT facility worth INR 27,000 Cr.

Last year, the Centre initiated the disbursement process for US-based chipmaking giant Micron under its $10 Bn PLI scheme to support the establishment of the company’s assembly, testing, monitoring, and packaging (ATMP) plant in Gujarat.

Besides, in the second half of the year, the union cabinet approved Kaynes Semicon’s proposal to set up its outsourced semiconductor assembly and testing (OSAT) facility in Gujarat with an investment of INR 3,300 Cr. 

Last month, the Karnataka government approved Zoho-backed Silectric’s proposal to set up a semiconductor INR 3,425.6 Cr manufacturing unit in the state.

“The huge local market opportunity, intense push by the government, and availability of government incentives such as DLI and PLI are all contributing to the VC interest in semiconductor,” Subramaniam said.  

Investors also believe that the funding landscape will only improve as the sector matures, with more entrepreneurs rising and ventures making more innovative products.

However, there is a twist in the Indian semiconductors tale. In December last year, the Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) was questioned by a parliamentary panel for surrendering 55% of the funds allocated for semiconductor and display manufacturing projects in 2023-24. Arguably, MeitY spent only INR 681.11 Cr out of the total allocation of INR 1,503.36 Cr as of March 31, 2024.

What’s Ahead For Indian Semiconductor Space 

As per Inc42’s Indian Tech Startup Funding Report, 2024, deeptech investments is a top priority among VCs currently. 

Even as the startup ecosystem battled with funding winter, more than $460 Mn was raised by over 73 deeptech startups in 2024 as against $496 Mn raised by 61 startups a year before. 

Investor interest in deeptech is projected to remain strong in 2025, driven by the GenAI boom. According to the report, early-stage investments are expected to focus on emerging sectors like vertical AI, AI infrastructure, and semiconductors. Notably, a survey conducted by Inc42 revealed that 22% of VCs identified semiconductors as their top investment priority for 2025.

“We think there will be more quality founders who will be starting companies in this sector, building for Indian and global markets from India. Therefore, the capital providers will have more opportunities to invest in,” Speciale’s Rao said.

Echoing a similar sentiment, Yali Capital’s Subramaniam said, “In the next 5-10 years, we should see improved growth. The success of the first few companies will further decide the rate of growth in funding.”

Meanwhile, AI chips and edge AI chips are key areas that are getting stronger and attracting investors globally. In a recent development, Apple is working with Broadcom to develop its first server chip designed for AI processing. However, India might not catch up to this fever soon.

Subramaniam said, “Some of the AI Chips in the latest technology nodes will need between $500 Mn to $1 Bn in funding. India, in my opinion, will start with analogue semiconductors like power controllers, motor drivers, audio chips, and maybe Edge AI and surveillance ICs in digital semiconductors before venturing to other areas.”

Overall, more funding is expected in the sector as India prepares to start the production of chips to cater to the growing demand for various consumer electronics devices in the country and globally. 

Moving on, India may see a spurt on the mergers and acquisitions (M&As) front as large global firms will try to enter the space and smaller semiconductor players with strong technology capabilities will increase in number.

This has started to happen already. Last year, construction giant L&T’s semiconductor arm, L&T Semiconductor Technologies, acquired Indian semiconductor design startup SiliConch Systems for INR 183 Cr.  

IT services major Accenture also acquired India- and US-based Cientra, a silicon design and engineering services company, last year. Infosys, too, completed the acquisition of semiconductor design and embedded services provider InSemi for INR 280 Cr last year.

In the coming days, consolidations are expected to increase in the country not only in the semiconductor space but also in the broader technology ecosystem. It is pertinent to note that more global players are getting active in the country in chip design and manufacturing space on the back of the Centre’s ‘Make in India’ initiative. 

Dutch semiconductor design player NXP plans to invest over $1 Bn in the country in the next few years to focus more on R&D. Apple is also increasing its manufacturing capabilities in the country.

[Edited By Shishir Parasher]

The post Semiconductor Startups Raise Over $28 Mn In 2024; Will This Year Be Any Better? appeared first on Inc42 Media.

The Indian electric vehicle (EV) industry witnessed another year of maturity in 2024. On the back of improving charging infrastructure, policy push from the Centre and state governments, and rising investor interest, EV sales saw a promising rise during the year.

Total EV registrations in the country rose 30% year-on-year (YoY) to almost touch the 20 Lakh mark in 2024, with electric two-wheeler registrations zooming 33% YoY to 11.4 Lakh.

It was a momentous year for Ola Electric, as it became the first Indian EV maker to go public in August 2024. In terms of sales, the Bhavish Aggarwal-led company retained its top position in the two-wheeler market. Its total EV registrations surged 52% to about 4.1 Lakh units in 2024 from 2.7 Lakh units in the previous year. 

With this, its market share in the two-wheeler EV market went past the 35% mark in 2024 from 31% in the previous year.

However, it wasn’t one-way traffic in the EV market as these numbers suggest. The competition intensified this year, with legacy automotive players Bajaj Auto and TVS Motor upping the ante. This resulted in Bajaj and TVS overtaking the Bhavish Aggarwal-led company in escooter sales in December 2024.

In August 2024, brokerage Jefferies said that aggressive discounting was helping Bajaj and TVS gain market share from Ola Electric.

Ola Electric Faces Fierce Competition

While 2024 began with Ola Electric continuing to lead the two-wheeler EV race, the game changed by the end of the year. The company posted sales of 32,424 units in January 2024, but this number dropped to 13,106 units in December 2024, as per Vahan data on December 30.

Besides the aggressive growth strategy of the legacy players, rising complaints about its after-sales service also seemed to have impacted Ola Electric’s sales.

The publicly listed company sold almost 42,000 units in July last year, which was 115% higher than around 19,400 units sold by it in the same month of 2023. However, in December 2024, its vehicle registrations slumped almost 57% YoY. 

On the other hand, Bajaj started the year with less than 11,000 monthly escooter registrations. This rose to 17,000 units in December 2024. 

Bajaj saw a whopping 167% growth in Chetak escooter registrations in 2024, albeit on a lower base compared to Ola Electric. Against the 71,942 units of vehicles it sold in 2023, Bajaj’s escooter sales jumped to over 1.9 Lakh units in 2024. 

In comparison, TVS saw moderate growth in 2024 and also faced volatility in sales throughout the year. While its registrations surpassed the 30,000 units mark amid the festive season in October, it saw registrations of a little over 16,000 units in December last year. Overall, it maintained its second position in terms of sales in 2024.

In another alarming sign for Ola Electric, Hero MotoCorp’s total EV registrations almost quadrupled to 43,662 units in 2024 from 11,142 units in the previous year. While this was a far cry from Ola Electric’s numbers, the brand familiarity and its network can help the company quickly reduce this gap.

Meanwhile, Ather Energy continued to be a laggard among the major two-wheeler EV players. The IPO-bound company’s escooter registrations grew a mere 20% to 1.25 Lakh units in 2024 from around 1.05 Lakh units the previous year. Its market share declined to 11% in 2024 from 12.2% in the previous year.

Gap Widens Between Market Leaders & Smaller Players

Some of the smaller players also saw their sales grow amid the rise in the overall two-wheeler EV sales. Escooter startup River, which launched its first EV in February 2023 and raised $40 Mn in funding in February last year, witnessed a 2,600% surge in its vehicle registrations to 2,501 units in 2024 from 92 escooters in 2023.

Similarly, electric motorcycle manufacturer Oben Electric’s vehicle registrations zoomed 1,100% YoY to 630 units in 2024. 

Electric motorcycle maker Revolt also bounced back strongly by the end of 2024 after it faced notices and fines amid the FAME-II fiasco in 2023. The RattanIndia-acquired EV company saw a 42% YoY rise in vehicle registrations to 9,911 units in 2024. Compared to only 533 units of electric motorcycles it sold in January last year, Revolt’s sales surged to 954 units in December.

High-performance electric motorcycle player Ultraviolette also saw more than a 50% YoY rise in its vehicle registrations to about 400 units in 2024.

However, Hero Electric and Okinawa Autotech, who were among the top players in 2022, continued to see their sales nosedive. While Hero Electric’s registrations declined 90%, Okinawa’s escooter sales slumped almost 85% YoY in 2024.

Overall, the top four players further solidified their lead in 2024 with a cumulative market share of 82.5% as against 71% in 2023.

Meanwhile, in the electric three-wheeler category, Altigreen Propulsion Labs, which was once a leading player, saw its vehicle registrations slump to a mere 12 units in December last year from 145 units in January 2024. On the other hand, startups like Euler Motors, Omega Seiki, and Kinetic Green saw more robust sales throughout the year.

However, legacy players like Bajaj, Mahindra, and Piaggio led the race in the three-wheeler EV category.

What To Expect In 2025?

After the cut in subsidies and action on several electric two-wheeler players for breaching the localisation norms under FAME-II, some of these EV makers have negligible market share and do not seem in a position to regain it. There is a clear consolidation happening among the biggest players. The rising competition will test new-age tech companies like Ola Electric and Ather Energy in 2025 and also provide them with an opportunity to show how resilient they are.

Meanwhile, low-speed escooters are seeing a surge in adoption due to the quick commerce boom. As such, this segment is likely to see a lot of action next year. Ola Electric has already made its intentions clear with the launch of ‘Gig’ scooters.

New product launches are expected to continue this year as companies look to increase their market share. While the demand for Ola Electric’s ebikes will be keenly watched, the impact of Honda’s entry into the two-wheeler EV space on the market will also need to be seen.

On the infrastructure front, the PM E-DRIVE scheme is likely to lead to further increase in the availability of charging stations, thereby increasing adoption of EVs. The scheme has a budgetary allocation of INR 2,000 Cr for establishing additional public charging infrastructure. 

Hero Electric has already partnered with EV charging network BOLT to set up 50,000 charging stations by 2025. More such collaborations and public-private partnerships are expected to improve charging networks across the country.

Sameer Aggarwal, founder and CEO of EV financing startup Revfin, believes that the focus on developing robust EV charging infrastructure and scaling up battery-swapping networks will make the transition to EVs seamless for consumers. 

“Coupled with innovative financing models and targeted efforts to reach underserved markets, the industry is set to overcome accessibility barriers and make sustainable mobility a reality for all,” Aggarwal said.

Meanwhile, after the public listing of Ola Electric, Ather Energy’s IPO will also be closely watched by investors in 2025.

[Edited By Vinaykumar Rai]

The post Two-Wheeler EV Sales In 2024: Ola Retains Top Spot But Bajaj, TVS On The Prowl appeared first on Inc42 Media.

It was an eventful year for new-age tech companies on the IPO front, with 13 startups going public in 2024. These companies cumulatively raised a staggering INR 29,000 Cr ($3.4 Bn). 

However, the going wasn’t all easy for the 19 new-age tech companies which listed on the bourses before 2024. While the shares of eight out of these 19 companies gained this year on the back of improving financials, sectoral tailwinds, and strength in the broader market, 11 ended the year in the red. 

Zomato emerged as a multi-bagger this year, while Paytm made a remarkable turnaround. Four stocks – PB Fintech, Zaggle, Zomato and CarTrade Tech – ended the year with gains in excess of 100%.

The losers this year included Nykaa, ideaForge, Delhivery, MapmyIndia, among others, as they were impacted by varied reasons ranging from lackluster financials to sector-specific issues. 

Overall, the market sentiment was positive throughout the year on account of large inflows into the domestic mutual funds and strong economic activity. However, the benchmark indices saw a decline towards the end of 2024 as selloff by foreign institutional investors (FII) and the US Fed’s outlook of fewer rate cuts in 2025 triggered a slump. 

Notwithstanding the volatility, which is expected to persist till at least Budget 2025, listed Indian startups emerged from the shadows in 2024 and investors will keep a keen eye on them in 2025. 

As we near the end of the year, let’s take a look at the top gainers and losers among the listed new-age tech companies in 2024 as part of Inc42’s ‘Year In Review’ series.

Now, let’s deep dive into the performance of some of the top new-age tech companies on the bourses this year. 

The Gainers Of 2024

PB Fintech

PB Fintech, the parent entity of insurtech major Policybazaar, emerged as the top gainer among the 19 new-age tech stocks which went public before 2024. Its shares surged over 170% to surpass the INR 2,000 mark from around INR 800 at the end of 2023.

The upswing came on the back of the company’s profitability streak, starting from the December quarter (Q3) of the financial year 2023-24 (FY24), and its foray into the healthcare space.

As a result of this, PB Fintech’s market cap zoomed to $11 Bn by the end of 2024 from $4.2 Bn a year ago.

The company posted a net profit of INR 50.98 Cr in Q2 FY25, with operating revenue zooming over 43% year-on-year (YoY) to INR 1,167.2 Cr.

Zaggle

Shares of fintech SaaS company Zaggle jumped over 150% in 2024 on the back of strong financial performance and strategic acquisitions to expand offerings. 

While the stock was on an uptrend since the beginning of the year, it saw a spike in early September after the company bagged an order from HDFC ERGO General Insurance Company. The uptrend continued as Zaggle announced two acquisitions in the same month.

While it announced acquiring a 98% stake in Span Across IT Solutions for approximately INR 32 Cr, it bought a 26% stake in Mobileware Technologies (now ‘86400’) for INR 15.6 Cr.

In Q2 FY25, the company posted a net profit of INR 20.29 Cr as against INR 7.58 Cr in the corresponding quarter of the previous year.

While the company continued to bag contracts from enterprises throughout 2024, it also partnered with the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) to facilitate the issuance of prepaid payment instruments to customers.

In its Q2 earnings release, Zaggle said it is actively seeking more strategic alliances and M&As with a combined strategy of small tuck-ins and larger investment opportunities in the SaaS fintech sector, including areas like NBFC and payments.

The company raised nearly INR 595 Cr through a qualified institutional placement (QIP) in December and is eyeing three more investments and acquisitions by March 2025.

Zomato

Zomato continued the momentum of 2023 into 2024, with its shares surging 136% to touch almost INR 300 mark.

It was an eventful year for the Deepinder Goyal-led company, as it took a number of new initiatives to strengthen its position in the competitive market. While it bolstered its quick commerce business Blinkit amid intensifying competition, it launched ‘District’ to further strengthen its ‘going-out’ vertical. As part of this, Zomato acquired the entertainment ticketing business of Paytm.

The company not only managed to retain its leading position in the food delivery and quick commerce markets but also saw an increase in its profits.

Zomato posted a consolidated net profit of INR 176 Cr in Q2 FY25. Though it was a decline of 30% from INR 253 Cr in the preceding June quarter, it was 389% higher year-on-year (YoY).

The company ended the year with its inclusion in the benchmark index BSE Sensex.

Currently, 23 out of the 26 analysts covering the stock have a ‘buy’ or higher rating on it. The average price target (PT) for the stock is INR 302.58.

Prashanth Tapse, senior VP (research) at Mehta Equities, said he recommends investing more in Swiggy. However, both Zomato and Swiggy should be part of the portfolios of investors. 

“Having said that, the valuations are expensive because the sectors in which these companies operate are new and lots of money is coming in. Though Zomato has more than doubled this year, the performance wouldn’t be the same going ahead as it’s an index stock now,” Tapse added.

CarTrade 

CarTrade Tech, which saw its share price double on the D-Street this year, largely traded sideways throughout the year and saw a breakout only in October due to improving fundamentals.

The online classifieds and auto auction platform recorded a massive 509% YoY jump in its consolidated net profit to INR 30.72 Cr in Q2 FY25 from INR 5.04 Cr in the year-ago period. 

On the rise in its share price, JM Financial said in a research note that while increasing understanding of the company’s business model and its growth drivers, along with the operating leverage story, justifies the uptick, it has caught further strength with the company twice sharing guidance on Q3 FY25 – a 30% YoY growth in consumer group and 25-30% PAT growth sequentially. 

“While PAT growth guidance was in line with JM Financial’s estimate, 30% growth in New Auto considering the relatively muted auto sales environment was a positive surprise. We expect these to drive sharp upgrades in consensus estimates,” the brokerage said while reiterating its ‘buy’ rating and PT of INR 1,655 for CarTrade shares.

Paytm

Paytm arguably had the most happening year among the new-age tech companies. 

From hitting rock bottom in the early months of the year after a regulatory crackdown to scripting a successful turnaround, Paytm saw the worst and the best in 2024.

The horror for Paytm started when the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), on January 31 this year, clamped down on Paytm Payments Bank, barring it from taking any deposits or credit transactions or top-ups in any of its customer accounts. The central bank stopped Paytm Payments Bank from providing any other banking services, such as UPI facility and fund transfers.

Following this, shares of Paytm plummeted to around INR 300 from INR 800-INR 1,000 levels earlier. 

The Vijay Shekhar Sharma-led company then decided to focus on its core payments and merchant lending business. Paytm has also been actively leveraging AI to save costs and time. As part of this, the company announced cutting more than 5,000 jobs this year.

The company also took some other steps like selling the entertainment ticketing business to Zomato and stock acquisition rights in Japanese digital payments firm PayPay Corporation to SoftBank to focus on its core business and boost cash reserves.

With the worst likely behind, shares of Paytm are expected to continue their momentum. 

Though there could be some profit booking, Mehta Equities’ Tapse believes that the stock can see another 20-30% growth if the company manages to post net profit in Q3 FY25 like it did in Q2. 

Paytm posted a consolidated PAT of INR 930 Cr in Q2, largely on the back of the sale of Paytm Insider to Zomato. 

Nazara 

Nazara Technologies doubled down on its acquisition spree in 2024. It started the year with the announcement that its subsidiary NODWIN Gaming will buy Comic Con India for INR 55 Cr. Soon NODWIN Gaming announced an investment of €8 Mn (around INR 71.8 Cr) in Freaks 4U Gaming GmbH, a German marketing services company for gaming and esports. 

Nazara also acquired a 100% stake in its subsidiary Nextwave. Its subsidiary Absolute Sports acquired Pennsylvania-based entertainment news site Soap Central for $1.4 Mn in an all-cash deal. Nazara also bought an additional 48.42% stake in Paper Boat Apps from its promoters Anupam and Anshu Dhanuka.

Most recently, its subsidiary NODWIN Gaming announced acquiring another 93% stake in gaming and esports media company AFK Gaming.

The acquisitions and market expansion this year were followed by Nazara raising funds from Zerodha’s Kamath Brothers, ICICI Prudential MF, and Plutus Wealth.

Despite major announcements, the stock didn’t see any significant growth. After a fall in the March-May period, the shares largely traded sideways. Overall, the stock gained 22% in 2024 and is currently trading at around INR 1,000 level.

The Losers Of 2024

EaseMyTrip

Despite its foray into new verticals, shares of traveltech platform EaseMyTrip remained under pressure throughout 2024. The stock fell more than 16% during the year. 

The company posted a loss of INR 15 Cr for the March quarter of 2024 due to a one-time expense. However, EaseMyTrip posted a net profit of INR 33.9 Cr in the next quarter – Q1 FY25. 

It also said it would enter the ebus manufacturing segment and announced its foray into the hospitality vertical with plans to build a five-star hotel in Ayodhya. It also acquired a non-controlling stake of about 13% in Eco Hotels and Resorts Limited. 

However, its shares slumped significantly after CEO Nishant Pitti sold shares worth INR 920 Cr. 

EaseMyTrip also made its third bonus share issue this year. Ex-bonus, currently its shares are trading at INR 16.6 on the BSE.

EaseMyTrip reported a 42.8% YoY decline in its consolidated PAT at INR 26.8 Cr in Q2 FY25. Analysts believe that significant competition in the traveltech market, with many unlisted companies also operating in the segment, and ixigo’s debut on the bourses are among the factors hindering EaseMyTrip’s growth.

Yatra

The year 2024 was not great for EaseMyTrip’s competitor Yatra as well. It slipped into the red and posted a consolidated net loss of INR 4.5 Cr in FY24 as against a net profit of INR 7.6 Cr in the previous fiscal year. 

In October, Ezeego Travels & Tours Ltd filed an insolvency petition against Yatra’s subsidiary TSI Yatra. However, the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) recently stayed the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) order to initiate a corporate insolvency resolution process against TSI Yatra.

Meanwhile, Yatra’s shares, which were on a downward trend since September, sharply declined to touch multiple all-time lows in October and November. The stock touched an all-time low at INR 102.4.

In the September quarter of FY25, Yatra swung back to profit and posted a consolidated net profit of INR 7.3 Cr. Its shares are down around 21% this year.

Mamaearth

Amid severe competition in the D2C beauty and personal care space and changes in its business model, Mamaearth faced massive pressure in scaling its business this year. This also impacted its share price.

The company also lost its unicorn status soon after it posted a consolidated net loss of INR 18.6 Cr in Q2 FY25. Mamaearth’s revenue from operations declined nearly 7% YoY to INR 461.8 Cr during the quarter.

Mamaearth parent Honasa’s cofounder and CEO Varun Alagh said in an analyst call that the company did not anticipate the high impact on margins from the renewed offline distribution strategy under ‘Project Neev’, introduced in November 2023.

Emkay Research downgraded Honasa to ‘sell’ from a ‘buy’ rating and gave a PT of INR 300. 

“Limited offline presence and slower growth in the core brand may pave the way for the competition, where recouping in the long term would be daunting,” the brokerage said. “We await proof of execution as the management aims for a business turnaround.”

Though JM Financial maintained its ‘buy’ rating, it said, “More work needs to be done to sharpen the focus in core categories, increase allocation to hero SKUs (salience of top-10 SKUs is 40-45% for Mamaearth vs 70-75% for other HPC brands), improve product superiority/proposition and execute better in 200K outlets (80% of weighted distribution for mass-premium brands).”

Honasa’s shares fell over 40% this year and are trading at around INR 250-INR 260 levels. Of the 12 analysts covering the stock, 4 have a ‘sell’ rating currently and 6 recommend ‘buy’.

Yudiz

Shares of NSE Emerge-listed blockchain and IT development company Yudiz Solutions took the biggest hit this year.

After listing at a 12% premium to its IPO price in August last year, shares of Yudiz touched INR 150-INR 160 level in January this year. However, amid its weak financials, the stock slumped over 50% in 2024 and was trading at around INR 70 level by the end of the year.

In between, the company also saw HDFC Bank freezing its bank account in which it stashed its IPO proceeds. The account was unfrozen after over a month.

Yudiz slipped into the red in FY24 with a net loss of INR 2.9 Cr, hurt by a slump in its revenue in the second half (H2) of the fiscal year and a sharp rise in employee costs.

In H1 FY25, the company reported a standalone net profit of INR 5,000 as against a profit of INR 1.34 Cr in the year-ago period.

While the year was a mixed one for new-age tech stocks listed before 2024, the 13 new entrants on the bourses largely had a positive 2024.

Most of the new-age tech stocks that went public this year listed at a premium to their respective IPO price. By the end of the year, only FirstCry and Unicommerce were trading below their listing price. Now, it remains to be seen what 2025 has in store for them.

[Edited By Vinaykumar Rai]

The post New-Age Tech Stocks In 2024: Bad Year For Honasa, But Who Gained The Most? appeared first on Inc42 Media.

India’s new-age tech IPO market saw a massive upswing in 2024, driven by increased investor confidence and a favourable macroeconomic environment. What does 2025 have in store for startups looking to join the IPO spree and enter the big leagues?

As many as 13 new-age tech startups made it to the public markets in 2024, cumulatively raising over INR 29K Cr ($3.4 Bn). And in 2025, this number is expected to double with at least 23 new-age tech startups eyeing a public listing, and looking to raise more than INR 55K Cr ($6.4 Bn) cumulatively.

As predicted in the beginning of the year, the general elections in 2024 played a pivotal role in the IPO numbers. In fact, in the startup ecosystem, only five startups got listed before the elections while the rest hit the market once there was more stability post the election results. In 2025, while no such major events are due, ongoing macroeconomic uncertainties like GDP downfall might make the public market volatile from time to time. 

However, given India’s strong position in the equities market compared to other global markets, experts believe that the IPO market is expected to stay bullish overall with the total worth of public offerings surpassing $20 Bn as against $16 Bn in 2024.

In Q3 2024 alone, India saw 27 IPOs, marking a 29% surge from the corresponding quarter of the previous year. These companies cumulatively raised $4.27 Bn or close to INR 35,000 Cr, registering a 142% increase year-on-year (YoY). 

With that, the domestic market commanded a 36% share of total listings in Q3 2024, surpassing the US, which held a 13% share. To be noted, some of the top IPOs of this season included Swiggy, Bajaj Housing Finance, Ola Electric, FirstCry and India’s largest-ever IPO, Hyundai Motor India.

The new year is expected to be more eventful as the highly anticipated public offerings of companies such as Flipkart, PhysicsWallah, Ather Energy, Zepto, HDFC Credila, and even the Indian arm of consumer electronics giant LG are expected to go to the public markets.

Lightspeed India managing director Anuj Bhargava believes that the public markets trends of 2024 will continue well into 2025 and the momentum is expected to be strong. 

“Though we have seen some recent softening, which was expected, fundamentally, nothing has changed. Domestic capital inflows remain strong and are getting stronger. While foreign investment inflows have been sporadic, I think that was also expected. And the market today is held together, in large parts, by domestic institutions, which was not the case a couple of years ago,” said Bhargava.

In 2025, Lightspeed is looking to book profits from some of its high-profile portfolio startups such as PhysicsWallah, OYO, Zepto, and Zetwerk.

Besides Lightspeed, a number of other VCs would be hoping for similar outcomes in 2025. Peak XV Partners MD Ishaan Mittal, for example, said that the VC major continues to be excited about the opportunity in the public markets given the trends are extremely positive both on the supply side of securities and the demand side.

“On the supply side of securities, which includes the companies going public, we have just seen the tip of the iceberg as we speak. Many market-leading, exciting companies are yet to go public in every sector – whether consumer brands or consumer internet companies like Meesho, fintech companies like Groww, or payments companies like Pine Labs and Razorpay. In the next 12-18 months, many of these companies will go public,” he added. 

Mittal believes that domestic capital and foreign capital investors are showing great interest in IPOs and their keenness to participate in the Indian public markets is evident from the reception for some stocks. 

Over 20 New-Age Tech Startups Line Up For IPOs In 2025

Within the tech startup ecosystem, at least 23 companies are gearing up for public listings next year, which would further add to the new-age tech stocks baskets for potential investors. 

The list includes Ather Energy, BlueStone, CarDekho, CaptainFresh, Ecom Express, Fractal, Infra Market, IndiQube, ArisInfra, Innoviti, OfBusiness, Ola Cabs, Pure EV, Physics Wallah, Ullu, Smartworks, among several others.

These startups are set to raise more than $6 Bn cumulatively in the process of fundraising via IPOs, as things stand. Depending on the market conditions, some of these companies might decide to trim the size of their IPOs. 

Of this, already nine startups have filed their respective DRHPs with the Securities and Boards of India (SEBI). Coworking space provider Smartworks and logistics startup Ecom Express have already received the market regulator’s approval to file an IPO.

A Surge In Tech-Enabled Startups Going Public

Unlike the past three years, when startups that made the public market debut were largely tech companies, in 2025, there is a big wave of tech-enabled startups eyeing public listings.

For instance, BlueStone is a D2C jewellery brand with an online presence as a part of its business model. PhysicsWallah, looking to become the first Indian edtech platform to public, is also offline-heavy at the moment. Even though the startup has a major student base online, a significant 40% of its total revenue is from offline coaching centres.

Similarly, the coworking space providers Smartworks, IndiQube, ArisInfra, DevX as well as WeWork and Table Space (also preparing for listing within a year or two), are platforms that use technology to enable their business processes, but in terms of the business model, they are largely similar to their traditional counterparts. 

Pointing to this trend, Aakash Agrawal, associate director, digital and new-age business at brokerage firm Anand Rathi, said that it will be important for the public market investors to be able to differentiate between pure-play tech companies and tech-enabled companies as that would be essential in deciding the valuation premium they can claim and growth opportunities they have.

“Take the example of OfBusiness. While it’s a solid company with good profitability, we must also appreciate that it is essentially a trading company with a tech aspect to it. So, what kind of multiples does it find for itself? How does it price its IPO given it’s a technology company as well? These factors are going to be very interesting to see next year,” said Agrawal. 

What Explains The Coworking IPO Boom?

Meanwhile, it is also interesting that there is a sudden surge in coworking space IPOs after Awfis made its successful public market debut in 2024. The market is attributing this trend to an increasing demand for flexible workspaces. 

A CEO at one of the leading coworking space provider companies told Inc42 earlier this year that India’s growth narrative, coupled with a commercial real estate boom, is creating a conducive environment for flexible workspace startups.

However, as the market gets cluttered, it would be interesting to see if all the impending coworking space IPOs emerge victorious in their IPOs in the coming months.

Speaking on the matter, Amit Ramani, CMD at Awfis, said that as coworking spaces prepare to enter a potentially crowded public market over the next 12–18 months, their success in securing favourable investor responses will hinge on several key factors, including financial health and profitability with investors focusing on companies that demonstrate sustainable revenue streams, robust growth trajectories, and resilience to market fluctuations.

“Differentiation will play a critical role, with coworking spaces standing out by offering unique value propositions such as advanced technology integration, premium amenities, sustainable features, and services tailored to specific industries… Scalability and market penetration will be vital; companies with a diversified geographical presence and the capacity to scale seamlessly are likely to be viewed as more viable. Lastly, adaptability to evolving work trends – such as hybrid and remote work – through flexible offerings and innovative solutions will be crucial,” Awfis’ Ramani told Inc42.

More Exits, Higher Returns In 2025?

With the tech startup IPO boom, profitable exits are becoming super critical for VC funds and PEs. 

After the 2021 IPO boom, 2024 brought a deja-vu moment for the PEs and VCs in India as the total gross exit value was $1.8 Bn in 2024, close to $2.3 Bn in 2021. Amid a global IPO market slump that had also adversely affected India’s stock market, the total gross exit value dipped to $700 Mn in 2022 and $1 Bn in 2023.

Next year, top private investors including the likes of Lightspeed, PeakXV, Accel, and SoftBank are eyeing far more gains by offloading stakes in both pre-IPO rounds and during the IPOs. Even though some VCs and PEs might sell some stakes at a loss, it will be compensated by high returns from other portfolios.

“Our focus is to continue to invest with a strong belief that we, in the venture capital industry, now have a very viable path to exit, not just a very strong IPO market about that, but also a strong pre-IPO market,” added Lightspeed’s Bhargava.

Pre-IPO Rounds To Get Increasingly Important

The concept of pre-round IPO is also undergoing a shift. As Bhargava pointed out, traditionally this term was narrowly defined and it was a financing round just ahead of a company’s IPO to set a benchmark for the eventual IPO.

“Now anything up to two years before an IPO is also a pre-IPO round. In addition to traditional crossover funds, lots of new pre-IPO funds have come up. We’ve seen family offices and HNIs being exceptionally active in this market. We expect this trend to continue,” he said, adding that the firm will certainly use pre-IPO rounds as an opportunity to exit some of its portfolio startups.

Meanwhile, the Lightspeed MD also noted that several technical and fundamental dynamics decide the VC firms’ decision around partial and complete liquidation.

“I think investors largely use IPOs as a partial liquidity sort of event, and then gradually exit over time. Similarly, on the pre-IPO side, people look to monetise also because we don’t want to go into an IPO with a very large shareholding from one shareholder. It places a bit of an overhang on the stock,” he added.

Besides, it’s important to note that in most cases, these VCs are also reaching the end of their fund cycles and they have to realise profits to give return to their investors.

The Fate Of Large Sized IPOs

With the successful IPOs of Hyundai and Swiggy in 2024, which were two of the largest IPOs in the history of the Indian equity market, the trend of large-sized IPOs are set to persist in the new year. 

Anand Rathi’s Agrawal said that while the small and mid-sized IPOs will be more frequent, there will also be 10-20% of the companies, which are eyeing large IPOs such as PhysicsWallah, Infra.Market and OfBusiness. 

“We think the IPO market will have secular growth next year. And these companies that will have large IPOs are private equity backed, raised a lot of private capital, and scaled up significantly, which warrants a large IPO,” he added.

Even though it was evident this year that many new-age tech startups, including ixigo, FirstCry, Ola Electric, MobiKwik reduced their respective IPO sizes from earlier planned, Peak XV’s Mittal believes that the scale of offering have no bearing on the success or failure of IPOs if the fundamentals are strong.

Answering The Valuation & Profitability Questions

The verdict of the market is clear when it comes to profitability – become profitable ahead of the IPOs or show a clear path to profitability in the near term. This sentiment is not going to change in 2025. 

However, the recent IPOs of MobiKwik, Ola Electric and Swiggy (to some extent) have proven contrary to these expectations. 

Some investors believe that sometimes household names, clear growth opportunities, and exposure to niche market segments might cause such exceptions but largely, profitability and strong unit economics are a must for the public market. Peak XV’s Mittal said that profitability must be and will continue to be key for companies going IPO, however, this factor also needs to be contextualised.

“This is a good time where founders and investors alike are focusing on profits. They are able to generate those profits without hurting the core of the business or without taking away from the future of the business. While profitability is important, we don’t want to compromise on the future potential of the company to optimise for short-term profits, we would rather optimise for long-term profits.”

Taking a slightly different perspective, Lightspeed’s Bhargava argued that unlike in the US where companies with less than $10 Bn or $15 Bn in valuation do not receive much attention in the IPO market, Indian investors are open to much smaller valuations.

“Promoters, founders, and early-stage investors are also conscious that you cannot price an IPO where you bring nothing to the table near term for incoming investments. At the same time, the IPOs cannot be very small because the companies need institutional investors following, index inclusion, liquidity in the market. But the point is, you also do not need to be a billion-dollar company to list in India,” Bhargava said.

On the other hand, it goes without saying that profitable companies can command a premium in terms of the valuation. 

“Ultimately it boils down to growth, free cash flow, and profitability. Wherever there is an opportunity to grow, we will see promising valuations. Sometimes valuations might be slightly steep given that they are accounting for a future market opportunity and scalability. Zomato has been an example of it earlier. Swiggy too cashed on that,” said Anand Rathi’s Agrawal.

Where Will FIIs Trend In 2025?

As per various publicly available data, Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) sold a net of INR 1.14 Lakh Cr in October 2024, the highest selling in a month so far, surpassing the numbers of Covid-19 pandemic period in March 2020.

Amid many currently seeing the Indian market as overvalued, rising inflation, and a few other global macroeconomic factors, in 2024, FIIs have been the biggest sellers. 

Even though this has caused volatility in the market, the Domestic Institutional Investors (DIIs) kept buying. In October alone they made the highest purchase of more than INR 1 Lakh Cr.

The market experts believe that FIIs selling will not impact the upcoming IPOs of 2025 as DIIs will remain strong and mutual funds are booming.

Even retail investors are expected to show continued support even to the new-age tech startup IPOs given these investors now have an improved understanding of the peculiarities of these businesses.

“If FIIs stop deploying capital, then it causes a larger problem. But currently, there’s no sign of that. And in fact, India is looked at as a sweet spot in the developing world,” Agrawal said.

Macro Policies Could Impact IPOs

Sector-focussed policies play an important role in driving stock performances and even the companies going public.

Devang Kabra, fund manager at Wallfort PMS, said that the policies the government tabled in the winter session of the Parliament will be one of the areas to watch out for. 

“For example, there is an Insurance Amendment Bill proposing 100% FDI, allowing relaxations for net worth requirements for companies to become insurance companies is tabled. Once it passes, we will see many big insurance brokers turning themselves into insurance companies and coming out with IPOs,” Kabra said.

He said that once a policy decision happens, it impacts several other industries down the line. This Insurance Amendment Bill might lead to IPOs of more hospitals. 

The Donald Trump Effect On Indian Tech IPOs

To quote global brokerage Bernstein, “Trump’s return through high-profile US elections added new layers of complexity to inflation dynamics and geopolitical assessments… How will global inflation pan out with Trump at the helm, and will export be a more critical area to focus on than domestic cycles?”

It is important to note that Trump’s win strengthens US’ “China+1” strategy, which is expected to give India a boost in its manufacturing sector.

JM Financial said in a research report that China, Mexico and Canada will likely attract higher tariffs, which could provide India with the benefits in a number of manufacturing segments — chemicals, auto components, electrical components, solar panels and solar cells, tiles and  other categories. 

Wallfort PMS’ Kabra also believes that the manufacturing sector will now pick pace further and there will be stronger ground built for their IPOs.

However, domestic IT companies now might have to deal with stronger immigration rules in the US. Plus, there is higher inflationary pressure and increasing pressure on the Indian rupee. These volatile situations are less likely to impact the IPO sentiment in the long run in 2025, however, some short-term cautiousness is likely to linger in the early months. 

Corporate Governance Blues For IPO-Bound Startups 

As the domestic market braces for a record year in the history of public markets, as predicted by market experts, it will also be key for the companies, especially new-age tech startups, to ensure transparent governance and clear strategic vision. 

After all, public markets are sensitive to these core factors. The recent incident of hoards of complaints against Ola Electric’s products and services and the negative impact of it on its stock is a case in point.

While many believe that startups are riding the IPO boom without being ready enough to function in a public market, Gautham Srinivas, Partner, capital markets at Khaitan & Co., said that all the companies preparing to go public have the utmost checks in place to meet the regulatory requirements.

“Public issues are not a one-month process. To file DRHP, a company needs two to three months. So, an absolutely thorough check gets done. All the upcoming new-age companies are equipped to handle a public issue from a regulatory point of view given the standards of governance they already maintain,” Srinivas added.

Edited By Nikhil Subramaniam

The post Startup IPOs In 2025: Why Investors Expect A Record-Breaking Year appeared first on Inc42 Media.

The cumulative market capitalisation of 19 new-age tech stocks, which stood at $40.6 Bn at the end of 2023, zoomed 67% in 2024 on the back of improvement in fundamentals and a rally in the broader equity market.

These stocks, including Zomato, Paytm, PB Fintech, Nykaa, Nazara Technologies, ideaForge, Yatra, and EaseMyTrip, among others, ended the year with a cumulative market cap of $67.6 Bn.

Zomato, Paytm, PB Fintech, Zaggle, and CarTrade Technologies were the key companies which drove this upsurge in market cap on the bourses.

Besides the 19 new-age tech stocks that were already trading on the bourses last year, 13 other startups made their public market debuts in 2024. Together, the 32 new-age tech stocks ended the year with a market cap of $101.22 Bn.

Profitability Shines Through

Profitability has been the central focus in the Indian startup ecosystem over the past two years, following the lessons learned by loss-making companies during the global market slowdown in 2022 after the Covid-19 era.

Both listed and unlisted new-age tech companies, including those preparing for public listings, are prioritising profitable growth to meet the expectations of investors. 

The resurgence of companies like Zomato, PB Fintech, and Paytm highlights the growing preference of public market investors for profitability.

Foodtech giant Zomato, which saw its valuation plummet by 60% to $6 Bn in 2022, staged a remarkable recovery in 2023. By posting profits in consecutive quarters from March to September 2024, Zomato further gained investor confidence. Its market capitalisation surged to $31.7 Bn by the end of 2024 from $12 Bn at the end of 2023, driven by improved profitability and the launch of new products. The icing on the cake was its inclusion in benchmark index BSE Sensex.

Similarly, PB Fintech experienced a strong turnaround. Its market cap more than doubled to $4.2 Bn by the end of 2023, thanks to significant improvements in its bottom line. The momentum continued in 2024 as well, as PB Fintech turned profitable in the December quarter (Q3) of FY24 and expanded product offerings and market reach, leading to a 160% surge in its market capitalisation.

Paytm’s journey this year serves as another example of profitability reshaping fortunes on D-Street. The fintech major’s market capitalisation slumped to $2.6 Bn in February 2024 from $4.8 Bn at the end of 2023 after a regulatory clampdown on Paytm Payments Bank by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). However, as the company turned profitable in Q2 FY25, largely due to the sale of its entertainment and ticketing business to Zomato, its valuation surged. By the end of 2024, Paytm’s market cap exceeded $7 Bn. 

Profitability or providing a clear path to profitability in the near term also played an important role in making IPOs of startups like ixigo, TBO Tek, and Awfis successful in 2024. 

As Lightspeed’s MD Anuj Bhargava told Inc42, “As a blanket rule, profitability and strong unit economics is a must-have. There can be exceptions for extremely large names, but it’s not the norm.”

Innovation & Expansion Driving Stocks Higher

Besides profitability, the other visible trend in the public market is the investors’ clear preference for new-age tech companies that can keep innovating while improving both top and bottom lines.

For instance, Zomato forayed into the events and ticketing business with the launch of ‘District’ app, which also had an impact on its growth on the bourses.

A Gurugram-based events company manager recently told Inc42 that it has become crucial for any consumer internet company to diversify its revenue streams, and Zomato is doing the same. 

Similarly, PB Fintech’s healthcare foray became a game-changer for the company this year. Even though there were concerns initially about its possible impact on the company’s balance sheet, investors became bullish once these concerns were addressed.

Prashanth Tapse, senior VP (research) at Mehta Equities, said this is a good opportunity to invest in PB Fintech given its foray into the healthcare space, which is a growing market. Besides, the company has the power of technology with it, he added.

Similarly, Nazara Technologies was on an acquisition spree this year after raising fresh funds. Though regulatory overhang on online gaming remained, hindering Nazara’s growth to an extent, the company managed to touch $1 Bn in market cap by the end of 2024. At the end of December 2023, its market cap stood at $0.75 Bn.

Zaggle’s growth on the bourses during the year was also driven by new product launches and expansion, along with profitability. With the acquisition of Span Across IT Solutions, the fintech SaaS company said it would enter a new segment – employee-related business. 

Better Understanding Of New-Age Tech Businesses 

While Zomato, Paytm, Nykaa were among the first set of new-age tech startups to go public in 2021, they suffered a rout on the bourses in 2022. While the negative sentiment in the broader market was one of the reasons for it, many market experts also believed that the public market was getting accustomed to the functioning of these companies at the time. 

Almost three years later, analysts believe that the market, especially retail investors, have a better understanding of the challenges and the growth prospects of new-age tech companies.

For instance, Swiggy and Ola Electric are both loss-making entities. However, their public issues garnered significant market interest. While Ola Electric is up over 26% from its listing price, Swiggy is trading around 40% higher from the listing price.

Both the companies are among the top players in their respective segments and operate in fast-growing markets, which seems to have helped their stock price. Besides, the surge in share prices of the likes of Zomato and RateGain has provided a strong footing for new-age tech companies listing on the stock exchanges.

Speaking on this, Krishna Appala, senior research analyst at Capitalmind, recently told Inc42, “Concepts like blitzscaling, front-loaded costs for long-term benefits, and the importance of scaling have gained acceptance among Indian investors.” 

And this is what seems to be behind the rise in the market capitalisation of new-age tech stocks. 

New Entrants Add Over $33 Bn In M-Cap

Compared to 2023, when only five startups went public, 2024 saw 13 startups going public, including names like Go Digit General Insurance, FirstCry, Swiggy, MobiKwik, Awfis, Ola Electric, among others.

At the end of the year, the total market cap of these 13 new-age tech companies stood at $33.6 Bn, which is 33% of the current cumulative valuation of the Indian new-age tech stocks under Inc42’s coverage.

Meanwhile, the broader market sentiment was also positive in 2024. As per a report by Pantomath, H1 of FY25 (April-September period of 2024) saw 40 Indian companies raise INR 51,365 Cr through mainboard IPOs, a 95% jump over INR 26,311 Cr made in the same period in FY24.

Benchmark index Nifty50 has gained over 8% in 2024. Helped by a surge in domestic flows and a resilient macro landscape, the Nifty touched its all-time high at 26,277 in September this year.

While the broader market saw volatility in November and December, Motilal Oswal expects a recovery to take place in the second half of 2025 after consolidation in the first half. 

“Indian markets are likely to face significant influences from a combination of global and domestic economic events. The anticipated rate cut by the RBI in February 2025, the ongoing trend of US rate cuts, and the expectations surrounding trade policy changes post Donald Trump taking over as US President in January 2025 will contribute to market volatility,” Motilal Oswal said in its Market Outlook 2025. 

Besides, investors will also keep a keen eye on the Union Budget 2025-26, likely to be presented on February 1 by finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman.

Due to the aforementioned factors and the ongoing IPO momentum, the public issue boom is likely to continue next year as well. Over 20 new-age tech companies are expected to go public in 2025, including BlueStone, Ather Energy, Zepto, among others.

[Edited by Vinaykumar Rai]

The post M-Cap Of 32 New-Age Tech Stocks Crosses $100 Bn Mark In 2024 appeared first on Inc42 Media.

India’s cleantech narrative witnessed some important shifts in 2024 helped by investments into solar power and electric vehicle (EV) infrastructure, and a much-needed innovation push for green hydrogen and nuclear fusion, which are coming under the spotlight as we step into 2025. 

Despite the progress in cleantech and climate tech innovation in 2024, the pace of progress remains slower than the accelerating climate crisis and the waste and carbon generated by human activities.

As per a report by the Centre for Science and Environment, India faced extreme weather events on 93% of the days between January and September in 2024.These claimed thousands of lives, affecting 3.2 Mn hectares of crops, and the overall magnitude of destruction was much larger than that. The outlook is grim not just for India or the Global South, but nearly every country worldwide.

While governments have looked to drive investments into climate tech and cleantech, the funding push and stronger policy measures have not created a groundswell for these clean technologies just yet. 

There’s still the question of which segments are getting the investments, and whether these investments are addressing the problems that need to be solved today.

As per those we spoke to, India’s cleantech priorities must include advancing renewable and clean energy solutions such as green hydrogen, enhancing waste recycling, improving carbon capture technologies, scientifically managing landfills, and implementing stricter ESG regulations for large corporations, that force them into action rather than just tokenism. 

In fact, as per Inc42’s research, the total amount of private funding in India’s cleantech sector has declined year-on-year (YoY) after 2022. This indicates a crucial gap that private investors have not been able to fill, either due to their fund structures or investment horizons. 

A report by IIMA Ventures and MUFG noted that out of the 800-odd operational climate tech startups in India, two-thirds have secured seed rounds while there is a noticeable gap in growth-stage capital. Less than 3% of the startups have raised Series B or beyond, indicating a need for more substantial later-stage investments to help promising solutions scale.

Meanwhile, as a country primarily dependent on fossil fuels as the energy source, India will have to make a significant shift in its energy source and storage to reach its net zero by 2070. An analysis by Wood Mackenzie shows that the country can achieve it by 2050 if renewable energy sources grow more than 5X comprising 76% of the total energy used, make trillions of dollars of investment, and harness the entrepreneurial spirit and immense software and data analytics skills that already exist in the country.

As the world grapples with the twin crises of climate change and energy security, India’s strides in cleantech can pave the way for transformative changes—both domestically and globally. With that, let’s dive deep into analysing what could be the key emerging trends in the broader cleantech ecosystem in the coming year. 

On The Inflection Point For Green Hydrogen 

Green hydrogen is the big north star for India’s clean energy project. The push for public-private partnerships resulted in collaborations between state-run corporations and businesses. 

This was in line with our prediction that the green hydrogen boom would be imminent in 2024. For instance, Amara Raja Infra successfully set up India’s first green hydrogen fuelling station in Ladakh for state-run NTPC Limited. 

In 2025, we expect startups to address the major headache of cost. While government financial support will become key in building cost-intensive electrolysers, concerns related to capital expenditure can be addressed only in two ways – tech innovation and scale.

Experts pointed to startups looking to produce green hydrogen more efficiently through commercialisation of R&D. For example, Peak XV-backed Newtrace has developed and is now expanding its groundbreaking membrane-less electrolysers to bring down the cost of production. The startup is now piloting its technology with BPCL and ONGC Energy Center, both major players in the energy industry. 

Similarly, h2e Power’s electrolysis system, based on solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) technology, claims to lower onsite hydrogen production costs significantly. And recently it secured Oil India’s (OIL) tender to establish a 1 MW green hydrogen project in Himachal Pradesh.

In many ways, government contracts and tenders is the primary source of revenue for such companies, and investors would be watching this space keenly to see which companies are able to engage with government organisations more regularly. This is similar to how companies in the drone and defence tech industry have to go about scaling up. 

Besides VC dollars, the ground will remain open for private equity players, government grants and corporate venture capital funds to back green hydrogen startups that can partner with large power companies.  

Sandiip Bhammer, managing partner of climate tech fund Green Frontier Capital (GFC), believes that besides the high cost, the other hurdle in scaling green hydrogen is the lack of infrastructure available. 

“Even if we produce it, how are we going to store it? How are we going to transport and distribute it? So these are all very practical considerations. But with the regulatory tailwinds and set safety standards, and with the big boys of the industry willing to spend money and innovate, better results are expected in the coming days,” he told Inc42. 

Currently, most green hydrogen projects in India are in a pre-commercial phase. In the coming years, the existing MoUs and pilots are expected to scale towards full-fledged commercialisation. 

Energy Conservation Through Automation

While making energy sources greener will continue to remain the focus, the efficient use of energy through industrial automation is another important area for climate tech investors in India.

Besides robotic process automation and internet of things, industrial automation is set for the AI revolution as well, which helps in demand and supply mapping, intelligent logistics and inventory management, reducing the potential for waste — energy and goods. 

In India, the likes of CynLr, Perceptyne, Difacto, and Accio Robotics are some of the top names that raised funding in 2024 and are set to make some significant innovations in industrial automation in the coming days. 

Arpit Agarwal, partner at Blume Ventures, said that simply speaking low energy consumption equals low emissions. Industry 4.0 and Industry 5.0 technologies, for one, could help optimise on emissions, because companies see these technologies as a way to save money, so there is a clear impact on their bottom lines. 

This should ideally accelerate further adoption of new-age industrial processes which will have a tangible effect on reducing emissions, he added. 

Steps Towards Direct Air Capture

Direct air capture (DAC) technologies are getting popular across the globe, and India. DAC refers to extracting carbon dioxide directly from the atmosphere for its storage and utilisation in some other industrial processes. 

As per IEA data, there are twenty-seven DAC plants commissioned so far worldwide, capturing almost 0.01 Mt of carbon dioxide per year. However, even these are in the early stages of development, and India is only now beginning to see the first signs of business innovation, with companies such as Kerone looking to emulate larger global DAC startups such as Climeworks, Heirloom Carbon. 

While meaningful business development around DAC is still perhaps a few years away in India, Dr Miniya Chatterji, CEO of Sustain Labs Paris, said that there is a spurt of newcomers coming into the space of direct air capture. Chatterji runs a global climate and sustainability-focused venture builder which also works with startups in India.

“We are evaluating the space and looking at the newer startups while also seeing the kind of innovation they are doing in expanding capturing carbon to other greenhouse gasses as well as particulate matters. We are evaluating how innovative solutions here can help in localised pollution control,” Chatterji said. 

While these startups are in the US, in India, DAC is still at a research level in engineering schools, she added.

Meanwhile, in the area of carbon capture, Chakr Innovation has already caught the attention of climate investors. Abhilash Sethi, investment director at climate tech and agritech investor Omnivore, said that growing innovation is visible across carbon abatement, removal, and resilience.

Will EVs Dominate The Cleantech Narrative?

Vehicle electrification will continue to remain one of the top priorities of the private and public sectors, in India and globally. However, VCs are now looking to infuse money into less-capex-heavy, innovation-led platforms that are driving electrification.

In an interview with Inc42 this year, Blume’s Agarwal said that OEMs are not a game VCs want to play anymore. He said that even the subcategories such as battery manufacturing and financing are also getting less VC focus in India particularly. However, it is pertinent to note that these areas remain open to global investors, PE funds, or VCs with large cheque sizes.

On the other hand, the sentiment is clear that innovative software platforms that can help drive EVs with better tech are going to emerge more in numbers and also get interesting for VCs.

GFC’s Bhammer added that the EV segment is far from saturated. “However, VC money will flow into less capex heavy and innovation-led platforms – the companies that basically spur the growth of the usage of electric vehicles through digitisation.”

Meanwhile, as per Gartner’s forecast, the world is expected to have 85 Mn EVs on the road by the end of 2025, growing 33% from 2024. The rise in EVs will continue to be dominated by China, followed by Europe and North America. The research report forecasts India to have 5 Lakh EVs by the end of next year

Will Waste Management Become Big Business?

Speaking of EVs, there’s a major problem on the horizon when it comes to recycling batteries. And indeed, this also applies for other electronics. 

In its recent research, Gartner claims that by 2030, automakers will enable the recycling of 95% of batteries from EVs to mitigate the risk of raw material shortage. Hence, more tech innovations could be expected in the recycling of Li-ion batteries, which will lower the burden on OEMs to invest in such technologies. 

Even though India introduced the 2022 Battery Waste Management Rules, there’s a lot of lag in implementation and innovation. Shubham Vishwakarma, founder of Metastable Materials, a Li-ion battery recycling startup, explained that Li-ion batteries haven’t been around for long and they have a very long lifespan (at least seven years). So significant volumes of these batteries will hit end-of-life soon.

“The industry is definitely paying attention. They know that recycling these batteries isn’t just good for the environment; it makes good business sense… But it’s not all smooth sailing.  We need more investment in recycling technology and better ways to collect and track batteries. Most people don’t even know how to dispose of their old phone batteries properly, let alone those from EVs,” the founder said.

As the industry prepares for more tech innovation in solving a comparatively newer problem of Li-ion batteries, it is important to bear in mind that the traditional problem of recycling of waste from landfills is yet to be solved in India.

However, with cleantech startups emerging in recycling and upcycling of waste materials including plastics, and VCs too willing to infuse capital behind tech, India is expected to continue seeing some novel developments, albeit at a slower pace.

Angirus, the Udaipur-based startup that makes building blocks or bricks from recycled plastics and other waste materials, is now set to scale up its factory at a commercial level. There are more startups likely to emerge that make cutleries from sugarcane bagasse and even biocomposites. 

Agrifood Life Sciences Will Gain Investor Attention

Sustainable farming processes, innovation in biotechnology in the fields of biomaterials, protein production, gene editing technology, precision fermentation are some of the key emerging areas of development expected in the coming years.

GFC’s Bhammer believes that India is in a unique position, because organised retail is evolving at the same time, and there is a requirement for consistent availability of fruits and vegetables throughout the year. And investments in agrifood tech is one way to spur supply in a sustainable manner, unlike the West, where farm production became heavily industrialised and one-dimensional. 

There are attempts ongoing globally to usher in clean technologies via sustainable agriculture and food production to meet the needs of a nation with as much diversity in food consumption as India. The most clear example of this has come in dairy farming, where a number of companies have looked to infuse tech into farm operations to improve milk production and distribution. 

Gujarat-based Zero Cow Factory is working on producing animal-free milk protein and dairy products using precision fermentation and bioengineering of microbes. Given methane produced by cow waste has long been deemed as a major greenhouse gas contributor, more technologies are expected to emerge to address this issue. However, the scalability of these technologies will only be answered with time.

Besides, there are smaller developments expected to keep happening in waste management with the use of BSF and in the areas of precision fermentation. In 2024, Zydus entered the fermentation-based protein market with Sterling Biotech.

Will Investors See The Cleantech Upside?

There’s little doubt that cleantech and climate tech in India is only now emerging from the labs and colleges. The next generation of startups need the support to enable commercialisation of research and development, the right infrastructure for developing cutting edge climate resilience technologies and helping lift the marginalised sections which are expected to be hit the worst by climate change. 

However, the problem often discussed is that not every segment might get the attention from private investors, especially VCs. Investments in areas such as clean energy production, EVs, industrial automation, and any developments in the intersection of sustainability and AI are expected to keep booming, but niche R&D-heavy models are struggling to see the patient capital that they require. 

“Climate action is a three-component opportunity. It includes climate mitigation, which is where most VCs are involved. And then there is climate adaptation and climate resilience, where the largely private equities are involved because the capital involved here is much larger and the payback periods are also much longer,” added Green Frontier Capital’s Bhammer.

Meanwhile, global collaborations are key, especially for a country like India. Recently, the US International Development Finance Corp said that it would consider more deals to accelerate India’s adoption of clean energy after making loans to solar equipment makers.

Though funding is expected to remain slow, investors continue to remain hopeful about the future of cleantech and climate tech, because at some point these technologies will mature. Omnivore’s Sethi added, “We believe climate tech today is where ecommerce was in India in 2011—on the verge of mainstream adoption. It’s a long-term game, with immense potential for building impactful companies without rushing for unicorn status.”

With several macroeconomic factors in play and regulations and ESG norms yet to become stricter, will India be able to take the right strides forward in nurturing cleantech and climate innovation in 2025?

The post The Year Of Green Hydrogen? Cleantech Predictions For India In 2025 appeared first on Inc42 Media.

By the end of 2023, the generative AI (GenAI) fever was deemed to be more than just a fad. And 2024 perhaps established the same with many calling it bigger than the internet itself. But what’s in store for GenAI in 2025?

Despite oscillating between moments of awe and scepticism, GenAI started embedding itself in the Indian tech narrative, mirroring global shifts. What began as a flurry of creative experimentation, quickly gave way to a deeper question: what next? 

In 2024, enterprises and innovators alike focused on analysing specific use cases, exploring niche applications across domains, and addressing fundamental challenges in implementation.

Though many industry leaders believe that even today, the lack of AI literacy is a major challenge in the country, and Indian enterprises, startups, and the government are still just scratching the surface of GenAI, it goes without saying that the adoption rate has increased significantly in the last one year.

Indian GenAI startups have risen to the occasion, driving innovation and pivoting to solve pressing problems across sectors. As predicted, Indian language models have gained prominence, discussions around AI regulations have intensified, and besides the model and application builders, more startups have emerged as enablers of GenAI deployment and infrastructure for enterprises.

What’s Next: The GenAI Predictions For 2025

As the ecosystem continues to mature, key questions about ethics, regulation, guardrails, and maximising efficiency loom larger than ever. These challenges signal that the technology is transitioning into a phase of pragmatic evolution.

Industry experts believe that 2025 will address these issues to a large extent, bringing further innovation and reshaping key sectors – finance, healthcare, travel and tourism, and media and entertainment.

While it might be difficult to predict the exact ways in which a fast-changing technology like GenAI will take shape a year from now, there are a few key things in focus – hyper-personalisation, conversational AI taking a step forward with voice-based interactions becoming more commonplace, the emergence of sector-specific LLMs, ethical AI steadily taking centre stage, among a few others.

Meanwhile, the competition on the ground is getting stronger than ever.

“As new opportunities and use cases emerge in the next 12-18 months, only some of us will be successful. All may not be commercially successful. I think it’s kind of a lottery, and no one knows today which use cases are going to be successful,” said Ankush Sabharwal, founder and CEO of CoRover, the startup which is building models to make conversational AI more human-centric.

Conversational AI Advancing With Voice In Focus

Have you noticed how bank customer support lines have changed these days?

It is rare to see a system these days which requires you to input the details on a keypad. One can simply respond by speaking and the bot on the other side understands. This is just one instance of how voice-based solutions are getting more prominent over text.

In fact, towards the end of 2024, this trend started picking up. Gnani.ai launched a speech-to-speech large language model (LLM) that can handle over 10 Mn voice interactions daily. NPCI, IRCTC, and CoRover together introduced “Conversational Voice Payments” for UPI payments on the train booking platform.

Gaurav Kachhawa, chief product officer at Gupshup, told Inc42 that businesses are increasingly integrating speech-to-speech or speech-to-text capabilities into their customer service platforms.

Gupshup, which helps companies enhance customer experience by deploying AI agents, recently helped a global beauty and haircare brand use GenAI-based voice assistant on WhatsApp. 

The process begins with a voice command from the user, for example, “I have dry hair and dandruff, which shampoo would suit me best?” Combining the power of voice inputs and GenAI, the bot gives the user a seamless shopping experience. 

In another instance, Gupshup helped a logistics brand use regional language-based chats on WhatsApp to generate interest from delivery partners.

“The focus is increasingly on solutions that can assist people across languages and dialects, making services more accessible to diverse user bases. Real-time translation capabilities are becoming crucial, allowing businesses to serve global audiences effectively,” Kachhawa said.

CoRover’s Sabharwal sees the shift towards more realistic conversational bots happening in two stages – first voice and then video. He said that voice will be the first big transformation in conversational AI, which is still in its infancy, and next would be video. For instance, imagine asking a question on a telehealth platform about basic symptoms of fever. In contrast to generating text or only an audio speed, there would be models or real-life doctors answering it in real-time with lip-synced.

However, it is pertinent to mention that on the back end, CoRover is doing speech-to-text and then text-to-speech conversions to deploy the voice-based models. Sabharwal said that direct speech-to-speech models are not common yet.

Investors To Explore Domain-Specific LLMs

With too many large language models already in the market and the space of LLM builders getting saturated, the next big opportunity for startups lies in building specialised LLMs for particular sectors that can solve specific challenges in certain domains and provide better accuracy than general models.

These LLMs will excel given their ability to learn and adapt to well-defined contexts instead of trying to be the jack of all trades.

Microsoft BioGPT is one such example in the field of biomedical. Last year, Bloomberg launched its BloombergGPT, an LLM that was purpose-built from scratch only for finance. In India, too, investors are exploring opportunities here.

“As the transformer-led LLMs reach their performance asymptotes, new investments in that layer are going to slow down unless a remarkably new architecture is invented, or a specialised LLM (for example, in bio and material science) is developed,” said Hemant Mohapatra, partner at Lightspeed.

For contact, as per data on Hugging Face, currently, there are 1.5 lakh transformer-based text-generation models in the market.

Vikram Ramasubramanian, partner at Inflection Point Ventures, also believes that there is potential for LLMs specialised in the pharma and healthcare space because the sector has its own nuances. 

“We’ve got LLMs for people interaction and customer engagement. We will get LLMs for manufacturing, planning, scheduling, for data analytics or the management part of it. We will also get LLMs for the finance projections, forecasting, and more for the healthcare data science and the life sciences,” he added.

The Age Of Composite AI Begins?

With the increasing dependence on GenAI to solve more business complex problems, GenAI companies are slowly integrating multiple AI methodologies to create AI solutions. Some industry leaders have dubbed this advanced AI as composite AI, which largely uses classic natural language processing (NLP), GenAI, and predictive AI to provide more customised and accurate output.

In fact, CoRover is also using this approach for its products, its founder said.

Gartner said in a research report this year that composite AI represents the next phase in AI evolution. Rather than focusing solely on GenAI, AI leaders must look to composite AI techniques as value will be largely derived from projects based on familiar AI techniques, either stand-alone or in combination with GenAI.

“For example, integrating rule-based systems with machine learning allows enterprises to handle unstructured data better, thereby enhancing their ability to derive insights from diverse datasets. By embracing composite AI, organisations can solve problems that were previously too complex for single-technique AI models to address,” the research organisation noted.

And the trend that will further accelerate the popularity of composite AI is the end of the “one-size-fits-all” model.

Personalisation Is Taking Centre Stage

It goes without saying that GenAI has so far found its biggest use cases in customer experience and going forward this is expected to remain a major trend. However, personalisation will increasingly play a key role in enhancing it further and improving customer retention.

While many industry experts believe that GenAI is still a few years away from driving hyper-personalisation, the shift towards bringing in personalised models has begun.

For instance, Gupshup’s Kachhawa said that enterprises are no longer satisfied with simple, generic replies when it comes to customer engagement. They are looking for ways to make the conversations feel more personal, meaningful, and relevant to cater to specific needs.

Gupshup claims that using its WhatsApp Business API, which sends highly personalised rich media messages, Arha Media saw a 5% conversion rate for payment messages and a 10% increase in repeat subscriptions by sending 3-4 Mn messages per month, showcasing the power of targeted and timely communication.

Anindya Das, cofounder and CTO of Neysa, also confirmed that in media and entertainment, it is working with clients and partners to help them deploy GenAI for content creation, language localisation, and hyper-personalised recommendation systems for streaming platforms.

While the focus on personalisation is increasing to meet individual and business needs, the shift has just begun. Industry experts see the need right now for the adoption of this approach in more departments in a company beyond just the marketing teams.

Agentic AI: The Next Big Leap From Traditional GenAI

With personalisation becoming the key and a growing need to improve the way LLMs currently solve problems, agentic AI is coming up as the next big wave of change in 2025. It’s also the latest buzz in Silicon Valley.

Deloitte describes autonomous GenAI agents or agentic AI as software solutions that can complete complex tasks and meet objectives with little or no human supervision.  

The consultancy firm predicts that 25% of companies that use GenAI will launch agentic AI pilots or proofs of concept in 2025, which will grow to 50% in 2027. India has also started embracing this leap.

If we look at the global AI landscape, Apple recently launched ‘Apple Intelligence’, a “personal intelligence system” that combines the power of generative models with personal context to deliver intelligence that is said to be more useful and relevant.

In December 2024, Google launched its latest AI model, Gemini 2.0, which CEO Sundar Pichai dubbed as the company’s entry to ‘a new agentic era’.

In India, Hyderabad-based startup Pulse offers an agentic AI platform aimed at SaaS product teams. It aggregates and analyses multi-source data to provide actionable insights, predictive analytics, and strategic recommendations. The startup raised $1.4 Mn in its seed funding round from Endiya Partners and the founders of Zluri and Yellow.ai in November.

Gupshup told Inc42 that more than 50% of its clients are actively exploring ways to use agentic AI to streamline their existing workflows. This shift indicates that agentic AI, with its deeper capabilities, is becoming the preferred solution for forward-looking AI projects.

“While GenAI primarily augmented workflows and chatbot functionalities, agentic AI takes this further by enabling virtual agents that can engage in complex, context-driven conversations and offer personalised recommendations or services,” said Gupshup’s Kachhawa.

He said enterprises are increasingly adopting agentic AI over traditional GenAI applications due to its deeper context understanding, reasoning, and ability to automate entire business processes.

However, brokerage Bernstein in a research note titled “Apple’s AI Rollout and Agentic AI” recently noted that agentic AI remains an open research problem with no proven solutions in the space, and with many leading startups releasing initial solutions that simply don’t achieve sufficient reliability for real-world use cases.

Ethical AI & Deepfake Detection To Dominate Narratives

At the start of 2024, we had predicted that with two major elections – the US and India – around the corner, deepfake cases would emerge as a challenge. And along with law enforcement, the government and legislators, there is also a parallel effort by tech startups to create what is being called “Ethical AI” or eAI. 

Though there were not any significant steps taken to ensure it and many instances of deepfake photos and videos kept shaping election narratives in the country, the conversation around global AI regulations started taking more real shape in 2024.

The Indian government’s INR 10,372 Cr IndiaAI Mission has mentioned ethical AI as one of the key objectives out of seven initiatives it wants to focus on over the next five years.

Meanwhile, moral principles like ethics cannot be implemented solely with government regulations rather it has to be embedded as the core value of organisations. Gupshup’s Kachhawa confirmed that one big thing companies are focused on right now is making their AI systems transparent.

He said that the concept of “responsible AI” has evolved beyond basic compliance to become a competitive advantage and businesses are seeing real benefits such as increased user trust and higher engagement if they make AI transparency and data privacy a priority.

It is also important to remember that sectors like BFSI have to prioritise deepfake detection as the misuse of AI might also put their customers’ data and transactions at risk. The emergence of startups like Clarity, Sentinel, and India-based Kroop AI makes this space particularly interesting.

However, IPV’s Ramasubramanian has a slightly different approach here. He believes that GenAI still is nascent and there are challenges with hallucinations. Hence, startups are emerging that can test and fine-tune the data to ensure compliance. In India, AiEnsured is one such example of a startup doing it.

Portkey is another such example whose platform enforces reliable LLM behaviour with its AI guardrails.

With that, it is interesting to note that the infrastructure layer of GenAI and LLM Ops is emerging as a key focus for investors to infuse money into. 

GPU-As-A-Service To Become More Prominent

GenAI is expensive and a major cost of building foundational models is driven by the computational expense – the graphics processing units (GPUs) or high-end control processing units (CPUs).

To make it more cost-efficient, flexible, and scalable, GPU-as-a-Service (GaaS) is emerging into prominence. 

Highlighting this upcoming trend, Neysa’s Das said that with a significant emphasis on cost-efficiency and scalability, many of its clients were actively looking for scalable GaaS solutions. And Neysa launched its Velocis AI Cloud, which now provides them with an end-to-end AI cloud platform that enables clients to train and fine-tune models while choosing the GPU that best aligns with their use cases.

In 2024 NVIDIA also released its Nvidia AI Enterprise product that includes services which cost $4,500 per graphics processor used per year. 

CoRover’s Sabharwal added, “Whether software companies make money or not, the infrastructure providers would definitely make money. There is a growing requirement for high computing – it could be GPUs or more advanced CPUs or some alternative to GPUs emerging.”

As part of its IndiaAI MIssion, the Centre is also working to deploy over 10,000 GPUs through strategic public-private collaborations.

There are a few other developments expected in the GenAI sector, such as the increasing use of technology in data analytics, the emergence of multi-modal AI, the rising penetration of small language models, more focus on Sovereign AI, and the collaborations of Blockchain and GenAI.

In fact, commenting on this interesting trend of decentralised AI, Bruce Keith, CEO and cofounder of InvestorAi, said that blockchain technology and AI together have great potential to enhance data security.

“Blockchain gives you authentication and AI gives you automation and more consistent output, and the convergence of the two together will start to answer a lot of data security questions that organisations have. However, since blockchain and crypto are perennially interlinked and different countries have different views on crypto, it is kind of holding back the development of Blockchain and AI together but it is going to change,” said Keith.

However, there are other key aspects that need to be addressed immediately. One of these is the huge power consumption by the large data centres that are required to drive developments in AI. The regulations are also weak and ask for more government support

Jaspreet Bindra, CEO of AI&Beyond, said that INR 10,000 Cr funding by the Centre is still insufficient compared to other countries, and there is a lot of hype with less actual support. “My vision involves bringing GenAI to the masses, much like Aadhaar and UPI. This would require the government to treat GenAI with the seriousness of a national mission,” he said.

With that, it now remains to be seen if 2025 can usher in some of the biggest shifts in the GenAI ecosystem globally and if India can keep up with these shifts.

[Edited By Nikhil Subramaniam]

The post The Era Of Agentic AI, Hyper-Personalisation & More: GenAI Predictions For 2025 appeared first on Inc42 Media.

The year 2024 saw a flurry of initial public offerings (IPOs) of new-age tech companies, as startups brushed off the funding winter and made a beeline for the bourses. While the funding winter continued to loom large in the private market, especially in the first half of the year, public market investors did not hesitate from investing in new-age tech IPOs.

IPO-bound companies took several steps, like taking valuation cuts and reducing the size of their public issues, to attract investors. Besides, the big returns given by previously listed new-age tech companies like Zomato and RateGain also boosted the confidence of investors, resulting in oversubscription for all new-age tech IPOs this year.

Almost in line with Inc42’s IPO predictions last year, more than 10 startups (13, to be precise) went ahead with their IPOs in India and got listed on mainboard and SME platforms. Many of these startups had been eyeing their IPOs since 2021.

The public listing boom this year was also driven by higher activity in the broader IPO market. On the back of robust retail investor sentiment, a significant rise in mutual fund investments, and increased investments by foreign institutional investors in the primary market, companies raised over INR 1.2 Lakh Cr in total from IPOs this year.

In that, the 13 new-age tech companies raised more than INR 29,000 Cr this year. Swiggy’s IPO alone was worth INR 11,300 Cr.

The successful IPOs of the new-age tech companies also provided partial exits to top venture capital (VC) and private equity (PEs) firms by selling stakes via offers for sale (OFS), resulting in them minting big returns on their early bets.

Some of the most prominent investors in startups that listed in 2024 were Peak XV Partners, Accel, Matrix Partners, Tiger Global, SoftBank, Temasek, Elevation Capital, Prosus, Alpha Wave, among others. Some of these investors even raked in over 30X returns from one IPO.

As part of Inc42’s flagship ‘Year In Review’ series, let’s take a look at some of the top investors who secured partial exits this year through the IPOs of new-age tech companies in their portfolios. 

Editor’s Note: This is neither an exhaustive list nor a ranking of any kind. The investors have been arranged alphabetically. 

Accel Books 38X Gains From Swiggy & BlackBuck IPO

Accel saw two of its portfolio companies, Swiggy and BlackBuck, getting listed this year.

Food delivery and quick commerce major Swiggy’s public listing was one of the major events of 2024. Its public issue comprised a fresh issue of shares worth INR 4,499 Cr and an OFS component of 17.5 Cr shares. 

Accel, which first invested in Swiggy in 2015 during its Series A funding round, sold about 1.06 Cr shares via OFS. While the VC major acquired these shares at an average price of INR 11.17 apiece, it sold them for INR 290 each for a total of over INR 412 Cr. 

Accel raked in 34.9X returns on its investment from these shares.

BlackBuck, which went public right after Swiggy, brought in 4.3X returns for the investor.

Having been an investor in the company since 2015, Accel India IV (Mauritius) Limited held 2.3 Cr equity shares of the truck management platform pre-IPO. It had acquired these shares at an average cost of INR 62.71 apiece. Of these, Accel sold 43.1 Lakh shares via the OFS for about INR 117.6 Cr. 

In the upcoming months, several other portfolio companies of Accel like BlueStone, Infra.Market, and Captain Fresh are also expected to go public.

Alpha Wave Triples Its Invested Capital In Ola Electric & Swiggy

Alpha Wave, which first invested in Swiggy in 2021, made 2.2X returns by offloading a part of its stake in the company.

Ahead of the foodtech major’s IPO, the global investment company held almost 1.9 Cr shares of Swiggy which it acquired at an average cost of INR 178.9 per share, translating into a total of INR 340 Cr. Of that, Alpha Wave sold more than a quarter, or 55.7 Lakh shares, of its stake in Swiggy for a total of INR 161.6 Cr.

Similarly, Alpha Wave made 1.22X returns on its investment by selling 37.83 Lakh shares of EV major Ola Electric worth INR 28.75 Cr. While the firm had acquired these shares at an average cost of INR 62.38 apiece, it sold them at INR 76 per share.

Several of Alpha Wave’s other Indian portfolio startups, including Lenskart, Ola Consumer, and Pine Labs, are also getting ready for an IPO next year.

Elevation Capital Emerges A Clear Winner 

Of all the top investment firms who sold their partial stakes in 2024 startup IPOs, Elevation Capital  (formerly SAIF Partners) emerged as the top gainer, making a whopping 47X gains.

Two of Elevation Capital’s portfolio companies, ixigo and Swiggy, went public this year. As part of Swiggy’s INR 11,000 Cr+ IPO, Elevation Capital offloaded 73.96 Lakh shares worth over INR 288 Cr. The average acquisition price of these shares was INR 11.44 apiece. The partial stake sale in Swiggy translated to 34.1X returns on its investment.

Ahead of Swiggy, ixigo also went public. Elevation Capital held a significant 23.37% stake in the travel tech startup pre-IPO. As part of the OFS, the VC firm sold 1.94 Cr shares out of the 8.8 Cr shares it held pre-IPO. While it had acquired these shares at an average cost of INR 7.14 apiece, it sold them for INR 93 per equity share. The stake sale gave Elevation Capital 13X returns on its investment in the startup.

Elevation Capital also saw FirstCry go public this year. However, the VC firm exited the omnichannel kidswear brand in 2021 with 10X+ gains.

Currently, SUGAR Cosmetics from the VC fund’s portfolio is also gearing up for an IPO in the near future.

Flipkart Gains From BlackBuck Bet

Flipkart Logistics Private Limited first invested in trucking platform BlackBuck in 2015 during its $6 Mn Series A funding round. Over the years, the ecommerce platform kept increasing its stake in the company and held a 13.2% stake, or 2.1 Cr shares, in BlackBuck pre-IPO.

It is important to note that in 2018, Flipkart transferred its ownership in Flipkart Logistics Private Limited to its Singapore-based subsidiary Quickroutes International Private Limited. Hence, the 13.2% stake was held by Quickroutes.

During BlackBuck’s IPO, Quickroutes offloaded 55.3 Lakh shares for around INR 151.1 Cr as part of the OFS. The company had acquired these shares for about INR 28.8 Cr, translating to 5.24X returns on the investment.

Swiggy Delivers 26X Gains For Norwest Venture  

US-based Norwest Venture Partners was one of the early backers of Swiggy. Norwest Venture Partners VII-A Mauritius first invested in the company in 2015 in its Series B funding round.

Ahead of Swiggy’s IPO, Norwest held 7.06 Cr shares of the company which it acquired at an average cost of INR 14.82 per share. By selling 64.06 Lakh shares as part of the OFS, it raked in 26.3X returns on its investment for these shares.

Going ahead, Norwest will have more opportunities to rake in big gains from its India investments as OfBusiness and Mensa Brands from its portfolio are eyeing IPOs. 

Peak XV Partners’ Mixed Performance 

Peak XV Partners (formerly Sequoia Capital India) sold partial stakes during the IPO of three of its portfolio startups in 2024 but not all led to gains.

While the VC major raked in 8.2X and 2.8X gains from the IPOs of ixigo and Awfis, its partial stake sale in BlackBuck IPO led to a loss of 11.6% on the invested capital.

Ahead of ixigo’s IPO, Peak XV held a 15.66% stake in the travel tech startup with a total of 5.92 Cr shares. Of that, it offloaded 1.3 Cr shares at INR 93 apiece as against the average acquisition cost of INR 11.32 per share.

Peak XV also offloaded almost 70 Lakh shares of ixigo at INR 93 per equity share in a pre-IPO secondary sale for INR 65 Cr.

The VC firm held 1.5 Cr shares of flexible workspace startup Awfis ahead of its public listing. With a 22.86% stake in Awfis, Peak XV was also a promoter. During the IPO, it offloaded more than 66 Lakh shares as part of the OFS for INR 253 Cr. The cost of acquiring these shares was about INR 89.7 Cr, giving the VC firm almost 3X returns.

However, Peak XV made only INR 30.7 Cr by offloading 11.26 Lakh shares during BlackBuck’s IPO as against INR 34.8 Cr it spent to acquire these shares.

Peak XV’s other portfolio startup Go Digit also went public this year, but it did not sell any stake in it during the listing, which would have also resulted in a loss on its investment. It also did not sell any stake in MobiKwik’s INR 572 Cr IPO.

Multiple portfolio companies from Peak XV’s portfolio, including BlueStone, Meesho, Ola Consumer, OYO, Pine Labs, among others, are also preparing for their respective IPOs in the near to mid term. Razorpay is also eyeing an IPO after FY26.

Prosus’ India Bet Sees Big Success With Swiggy 

It was a mixed year for Prosus in India, with it writing-off its investment in BYJU’S and seeing a success in the form of Swiggy’s IPO.

Prosus booked 3X returns on its investment in the foodtech company. It first invested in Swiggy via Myriad International Holdings (MIH) India Food Holdings in 2018, leading the company’s $1 Bn funding round. 

Ahead of Swiggy’s IPO, Prosus held a 31% stake or more than 69 Cr shares in Swiggy that had an average acquisition cost of INR 131.15 per share. As part of the OFS, it sold 10.9 Cr shares for INR 390 apiece, making 3X gains.

In the coming months, some of Prosus’ top IPO-bound portfolio companies in India are Meesho, PayU and BlueStone. Its other startups such as Mensa Brands and Captain Fresh are also gearing up for public listings.

Fabricio Bloisi, chief executive officer of Prosus, recently said, “India remains a key growth market for Prosus given the country’s impressive digital transformation in the consumer and enterprise sectors. We are excited about the region and see huge opportunities for value creation including a strong IPO pipeline within our current portfolio.”

Schroders Capital Exits FirstCry With 3X Returns

During the IPO of FirstCry in August 2024, UK-based global investment firm Schroders Capital was the only one which completely exited the kids-focussed omnichannel retailer.

Schroders Capital Private Equity Asia Mauritius II Limited sold its entire 0.78% stake, or 38 Lakh shares, for INR 465 per share, making 3.2X returns on its investment. It had acquired the shares of FirstCry at INR 145.26 apiece.

SoftBank’s India IPO Hat Trick 

The Japanese investment giant minted 8X returns by offloading parts of its stakes in three tech startup IPOs this year – Unicommerce, FirstCry, and Ola Electric.

SoftBank’s SVF Frog (Cayman) Ltd had infused over INR 2,000 Cr in the Supam Maheshwari-led kidswear brand since its inception and had a pre-offer shareholding of 25.52%.

Out of the 12.4 Cr shares it held, SVF sold 2.03 Cr shares of FirstCry for INR 944.8 Cr as part of the OFS during the IPO, making 3X gains on its investment in these shares.

During Unicommerce’s IPO, SoftBank’s SB Investment Holdings (UK) Limited offloaded 1.62 Cr shares out of the 3.2 Cr shares it held. SB Investment Holdings had invested around INR 50 Cr to buy these shares of Unicommerce. It sold them for INR 174.6 Cr, translating to 3.5X returns on its investment.

In Ola Electric’s IPO, SoftBank, via SVF II Ostrich (DE) LLC, sold 2.38 Cr equity shares out of the 81.04 Cr shares it held in the EV startup. SoftBank sold shares worth about INR 181.31 Cr as part of the OFS as against its investment of INR 122.55 Cr to acquire those shares, which translated to 1.5X returns.

While Swiggy was another startup from its portfolio which went public this year, SoftBank did not sell any stake in the company during its public market debut.

IPO-bound Ola Consumer, Meesho, OYO, OfBusiness, and Flipkart are also backed by SoftBank.

Temasek Makes Lacklustre Returns From Ola Electric 

Singapore government’s sovereign wealth fund Temasek saw Ola Electric go public this year, the second company from its portfolio to do so after Zomato in 2021.

However, Temasek only made 1.01X returns by partially selling its stake in the Bhavish Aggarwal-led electric two-wheeler startup. 

Temasek, which held 4.6 Cr shares of Ola Electric via MacRitchie Investments Pte. Ltd, sold 13.5 Lakh shares as part of the OFS for INR 10.3 Cr. The average cost of acquiring these shares was a little over INR 10.1 Cr.

Recently, Temasek invested in Rebel Foods, which is also preparing for an IPO. Besides, two of its other Indian portfolio companies, Star Agriwarehousing and Dr Agarwal’s Health Care recently filed their DRHPs.

Tencent Strikes Gold With Swiggy 

Like Prosus, Tencent also made big gains from Swiggy’s public listing.

Tencent Cloud Europe B.V. held 8.12 Cr shares of Swiggy at a weighted average price of INR 165.47 per equity share. As part of the OFS, the Chinese internet company sold 63.27 Lakh shares worth INR 246.7 Cr, translating to 2.3X returns on its investment in these shares.

Tencent is also a backer of IPO-bound Flipkart.

Tiger Global Rakes In Over 10X Returns From BlackBuck, Ola Electric

Tiger Global was one of the top gainers from EV startup Ola Electric’s INR 6,000 Cr+ public listing this year.

Via its Internet Fund III Pte Ltd, the global PE fund sold almost 63.61 Lakh shares worth INR 48.34 Cr in Ola Electric. The fund had invested around INR 7.44 Cr to buy these shares, which gave it 6.5X returns on its investment.

Besides, Tiger Global also made 3.95X returns by selling 13.69 Lakh shares of BlackBuck. It acquired these shares for approximately INR 9.4 Cr and sold them at INR 37.4 Cr in the OFS. 

Tiger Global recently exited Flipkart, whose public issue is one of the most-awaited in the Indian startup ecosystem, reportedly making $3.5 Bn in gains. Besides, many of its other portfolio companies are getting ready for public market debuts in India, including Ola Consumer, Razorpay, Captain Fresh, Infra.Market. Meesho, which is also eyeing public listing in 2025, recently roped in Tiger Global as an investor.

TPG Rakes In 5X Gains From FirstCry

TPG holds stakes in FirstCry via two funds – TPG Growth V SF Markets Pte. Ltd and NewQuest Asia Investments III Limited. Ahead of the startup’s IPO, it cumulatively held a 8.76% stake in it.

During FirstCry’s IPO, TPG Growth offloaded about 39 Lakh shares for INR 465 apiece as against the weighted average cost of INR 280.87 apiece for acquiring these shares, translating to 1.66X returns.

TPG’s NewQuest Asia offloaded 41.4 Lakh shares of FirstCry for INR 192.5 Cr. It had acquired these shares at INR 55.4 Cr, translating to 3.48X returns.

Overall, it raked in 5.14X gains.

World Banks’s IPO Bet In India

The private sector lending arm of the World Bank Group, International Finance Corporation (IFC), first invested in BlackBuck in 2017 in its Series C funding round. 

Ahead of the startup’s IPO, IFC held 92.2 Lakh shares in it. It made 1.4X returns by selling almost 23.4 Lakh shares as part of the OFS.

In the coming months, several of IFC’s portfolio startups in India are expected to go public, including logistics startup Shadowfax, healthcare startup Portea Medical, and online grocery platform BigBasket.

Z47 Scores 9X Returns From Ola Electric 

Z47 (erstwhile known as Matrix Partners) first invested in the Bhavish Aggarwal-led electric mobility startup in 2019, along with Tiger Global, in its Series A funding round. Following this, the VC firm kept infusing capital in Ola Electric in several follow-up rounds.

Ahead of the IPO, Matrix Partners via Matrix Partners India Investments III, LLC held 12.66 Cr shares of Ola Electric, which it acquired at a weighted average price of INR 8.22 per equity share. 

As part of the OFS, the firm sold 37.27 Lakh shares for around INR 28.33 Cr, translating to 9.2X returns on its investment for these shares.

Z47 continues to hold 30.2 Lakh shares of Ola Electric via Matrix Partners India III AIF Trust.

Ola Consumer is another IPO-bound startup in the VC firm’s portfolio. Besides, Razorpay, Captain Fresh, and OfBusiness from its portfolio are also looking to go public.

[Edited By Vinaykumar Rai]

The post VCs Mint Big Returns As Startup IPOs Light Up D-Street In 2024 appeared first on Inc42 Media.

It’s almost the end of 2024, and by now, you are likely familiar with ChatGPT — a platform that has revolutionised how people write, code, or carry out various creative tasks. You’ve probably also come across other generative AI (GenAI) tools like Claude, Bard, and DALL-E.

With the rapid rise in GenAI adoption and an ever-growing number of models available, users often face the challenge of selecting the right tools.

However, what if there’s a single platform that could offer access to multiple GenAI tools under one subscription plan at a fraction of the cost?

This is exactly what OneAIChat is currently trying to do. The Mangaluru-based startup aggregates various GenAI tools into one platform, helping users save time and money while eliminating the hassle of juggling multiple AI tools.

While the approach isn’t entirely new, and a few international companies are already working on this concept, OneAIChat is undoubtedly one of the pioneering names from the country to be pursuing this. In its endeavour, it desires to serve users in creative fields and STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) use cases.

Founded in 2023 by Prasad Kale, OneAIChat claims to provide one subscription with unlimited access across various LLMs, potentially saving professionals 30-40% on the AI tools available in the market.

As the enablement layer of GenAI continues to get stronger and attract more investments, OneAIChat is set to play a critical role in India’s GenAI market set to breach the $17 Bn mark by 2030. 

OneAIChat’s Game Plan

It is now well-established that GenAI is shaping almost every aspect of human communication, content creation, science and research, and business management, gradually becoming part of our everyday lives. 

Despite transitioning from a solely free-to-use platform to a subscription model starting at $20 per month, ChatGPT’s user base has continued to grow significantly. It recorded more than 200 Mn weekly active users in August this year. 

However, the problem is that ChatGPT has its shortcomings. For instance, it is largely good at generating human-like text responses to different prompts but struggles with certain domain-specific questions and hallucinations. In many cases, Anthropic’s Claude has proven to perform better than ChatGPT.

Meanwhile, OpenAI’s Sora, which is specifically built for video generation, is often compared to Stability AI’s Stable Diffusion. Even Elon Musk has entered the fray with Grok AI, focussing on image generation.

Besides the main foundational models, more than 1.2 Lakh transformer-based models are available in the market across natural language processing, computer vision, and multimodal use cases such as audio-to-text, text-to-image, video-to-text, and so on.

As OneAIChat has taken the multimodal approach by bringing several of these models together, the startup is helping create comprehensive content by generating blogs, visuals, audio, documents, and music. Yet these are categorised and focussed towards precise industry needs.

Speaking with Inc42, OneAIChat’s founder Kale said, “When we say aggregation, it’s not just providing ChatGPT and Gemini or Mistral of the world, we have partnered with the likes of Haiper, which has been doing text-to-video for the last eight months now; we have partnered with Beethoven, which is an Indian company for text-to-audio; we have also partnered with some niche image generators like Ideogram.”

OneAIChat is also building its own models, using various open-source foundational models. Currently, these models have 11 “focus categories”, including health, marketing, coding, faith, science, finance, and art.

Prasad, who comes with more than a decade of product development experience in Reliance and startups like MobiKwik and Intelegain Technology, dedicated the last one year to building these in-house models and forging partnerships with the global GenAI giants.

While much of it requires subscriptions, certain tools in OneAIChat are free of cost. Besides, the startup is not B2B focussed and is rather providing common users with its platform.

How Does OneAIChat Make Money? 

One of the key factors driving the growth of OneAIChat is the high subscription fees of existing GenAI models and applications. This is also exactly where the GenAI aggregation startup has an edge.

To give a few examples, ChatGPT Plus has a monthly cost of $20 while ChatGPT Pro comes with a $200 monthly cost. Similarly, Claude Pro and Gemini Advanced cost around $20 per month.

On the other hand, OneAIChat offers six tiers of subscriptions — from $13 to $1,000 per month — which include unlimited free access across 10 or more tools and models that users can pick and choose from. 

Its daily subscription plan starts at $13 (INR 1,099) and provides access to all pro models provided by OpenAI, Anthropic, Stability AI, Google’s Gemini, DALL-E, and more, and allows generating an image to audio documents, and more.

OneAIChat’s monthly subscription costs around $84 (INR 7,099) with access to the same features. Besides, the platform also provides quarterly and yearly subscriptions.

OneAIChat’s founder Kale said that besides the attractive price points, the platform also stands out because of its unique daily subscription feature.

“Two of our biggest differentiators are that we provide unlimited tokens (the prompts) and not restricting users to a monthly subscription,” he said. 

According to the founder, users often come to pro-generative AI platforms for specific tasks and don’t need them for a full month. So, now they don’t have to subscribe to multiple platforms and pay $200+ for a full month when they only need it for a day or two.

The Road Ahead For OneAIChat

The journey of OneAIChat has just begun. Currency, the startup is growing its footprint markets in India, the US, the UK, South Korea, China, Australia and Zealand, Japan, Canada, South America, and a few other European countries with free access to its platform.

The startup is currently bootstrapped but plans to raise $9 Mn-$10 Mn in the next three to five years in external funding. 

By the end of the June quarter of the next fiscal year (Q1 FY26), OneAIChat expects to onboard at least 30,000 users on its platform when it also sees a revenue inflow.

Once it starts clocking revenue, OneAIChat has a rough estimate of generating $761K in sales in three months.

Meanwhile, the startup will continue to refine its LLM models and develop highly sophisticated models fine-tuned for domain-specific use cases, particularly in health and finance.

Going forward, OneAIChat expects its largest revenue to come from the European region, followed by the Americas.

With US-based platforms like Magai and Poe developed by Quora working on a similar business model and TCS launching the GenAI aggregation platform, WisdomNext, for businesses, it will be interesting to see OneAIChat tap into the vast global market opportunity.

All said and done, while OneAIChat’s innovative aggregation model holds promise, the startup faces stiff competition from established global players and emerging Indian rivals. Its pricing model and focus on individual users could carve out a niche but long-term success will depend on staying ahead in a rapidly evolving GenAI landscape.

[Edited By Shishir Parasher]

The post Can OneAIChat Become The One-Stop Shop For All GenAI Tools? appeared first on Inc42 Media.

“Tesla is for the West; Ola is for the rest,” declared India’s much-celebrated (often controversial) entrepreneur and the founder and CEO of Ola Electric, Bhavish Aggarwal, this year.

Aggarwal, who is also now dubbed as India’s own Elon Musk, took such jabs at Tesla and Musk earlier as well, but this time, the statement encapsulated the audacious vision of Ola Electric and its aggressive competitiveness against the domestic rivals after it became a public company.

Starting mid last year, Ola Electric’s listing was one of the most-awaited events of 2024. Given it became the first Indian new-age EV startup to go public, it was hailed as a landmark moment signalling India’s readiness to embrace the rapid shift to electric mobility. 

While Ola’s meteoric rise captured the attention of stock market investors and analysts alike, its journey this year has also been riddled with missteps – customer complaints, fire incidents, and how Aggarwal handled these negative incidents.

It is true that Ola Electric maintained its leading position in the market in terms of sales and ascertained its ability to beat its competitors. However, the electric vehicle maker ended up losing some market share during the year amid a deteriorating public image and the growing strength of players like TVS Motor and Bajaj Auto.

But none of these negative incidents stopped Ola Electric from making further announcements and product forays throughout 2024, including electric motorcycles, electric three-wheelers, and low-speed electric scooters. 

Meanwhile, not all of the startup’s previous announcements were fructified during the year. Despite major promotions of its electric car launch, which was expected in 2024, the plan has now been kept on hold.

This is the story of a startup balancing the promise of pioneering disruption and the reality of falling short—a year that has left the country’s burgeoning EV ecosystem watching whether Ola can truly deliver on its founder’s bold proclamation.

Ola Electric’s 2024: Did Too Many Moves Spoil The Broth? 

The verdict of the automotive veterans and many analysts has been the same in recent days – Ola Electric should focus on one product, its scooters, and address its existing problems, rather than trying its hands on multiple other product categories.

However, that’s not what Aggarwal does anyway. Even in the case of Ola Cabs, the ambitious young entrepreneur has tried out multiple verticals even if it led to significant cash burn and gradual shutdown of the verticals. Today, Ola Cabs is Ola Consumer and Aggarwal is trying anew to make a business out of it on the back of food delivery and potentially quick commerce.

He followed the same strategy for Ola Electric as well on the back of the EV industry boom, a deep pool of capital, and strong branding. 

We can categorise Ola Electric’s 2024 major events into broader buckets – the public market debut, electric motorcycle launch, product portfolio expansion, and escalated customer concerns. Before delving into the missteps, let us first do a quick recap of several other developments in the company that shaped Ola Electric’s story this year and would play a major role in the coming months.

• The EV startup expanded its electric scooter portfolio with the launch of S1X 4kWh in January this year. By December, it expanded it further introducing Ola Gig and S1 Z range of scooters. With that, the startup would soon start locking horns with companies like Yulu and Baaz.
• The company forayed into the electric motorcycle market with the launch of three motorcycles – Roadster X, Roadster, and Roadster Pro. The deliveries are expected to begin in 2025.
• Ola Electric mass rolled out its upgraded Move OS 4 software platform for its two-wheelers earlier this year and also introduced its in-house navigation system, Ola Maps.
• It doubled down on its battery technology – unveiled in-house, indigenous 4680 cells and announced developing solid-state batteries.
• Going beyond battery production for its scooters, the company launched a storage system, Ola PowerPod, which would work like an inverter to power small household appliances such as lights, fans, WiFi routers.
• Two of its scooter models received domestic value addition (DVA) certification under the production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme.
• After two-wheelers, Ola Electric announced its decision to venture into the electric three-wheeler market.
• Despite being a high-valuation IPO, Ola Electric received decent traction from public market investors.

However, none of these important milestones could stop the company from ending the year in a lacklustre manner. From over a 30% market share at the beginning of the year, the startup’s market share in the electric two-wheeler market fell in the 20-25% range by November.

A social media spat between Aggarwal and standup comedian Kunal Kamra brought fresh light to Ola Electric’s poor after-sales service leading to a probe launched by CCPA against the company. The startup made multiple claims and announcements after that as a damage control mechanism but their real impact isn’t yet clear.

In fact, requesting anonymity, an industry veteran told Inc42 that it is now time for Aggarwal to go back to its drawing board and re-evaluate the R&D that went into building its base product rather than venturing into multiple other categories and trying to become India’s Musk. 

Even though Aggarwal has been swift in defending the shortcomings in Ola’s products and servicing, he should have realised that at the end of the day, it is only the customers that make you and break you, said the industry leader.

What Went Wrong For Ola Electric?

It’s important to remember that the recent incidents of fire and stories of disgruntled customers are not the first such cases. While a few safety incidents took place in 2022 and 2023 as well, and social media was always a testament to customer frustrations over its EVs, the matter was buried under the glamorous sales figures and product forays.

In January 2023, Ola Electric launched ‘Ola Care Subscription’ to improve its after-sales service. However, almost two years later, the true impact of the subscription plan remains unclear today. 

Meanwhile, as the issues escalated around August this year, Ola Electric announced the launch of a new offering called “HyperService” to offer “one-day resolution” of service-related issues. 

It is now a common buzz in the automotive industry that Ola Electric should only let its actions speak if it has to sustain itself in the market in the coming decades.

Speaking to Inc42, Dr Allabaksh Naikodi, an industry veteran who led EV verticals in companies like Royal Enfield and Mahindra, said that Ola Electric missed a golden opportunity to establish itself as a credible EV brand in the market even though it had every resource – funds, valuation, and branding.

“The problem with Ola Electric is that the management doesn’t come from the automotive, aerospace or railway backgrounds – the industries that highly prioritise fail safety. These industries carry out extensive testing, validation, and analysis of vehicles at various kinds of failure modes to ensure the highest amount of safety for humans. Ola Electric might have bypassed such processes to a certain extent in a hurry to come to the market,” said Naikodi.

According to the industry leader, the new product development cycle at most of the top automotive companies is at least 36 months, which might go up to 46 months. However, that never seemed to be the case for Ola Electric. 

Despite such underlying issues, the startup became public this year with huge losses in its books. In fact, in a recent analysis of Ola Electric’s future, we found out that the company’s future hinges on two crucial factors — its ability to turn the narrative when it comes to poor servicing and to turn profitable, which is linked to its EV sales volume.

While some brokerages see the startup turning profitable by FY27, it now remains to be seen what aggressive measures Ola Electric’s management team takes to attain profitability. As 2024 ends with a layoff of at least 500 employees in the company and lowered vehicle prices to keep up with the competition, it is unlikely that 2025 is going to be any less eventful for Ola Electric and its stakeholders.

What Lies Ahead?

It goes without saying that Aggarwal is not going to step back from his aggressive goals of product and market expansion. However, like in earlier instances, there could be possible delays in new product deliveries. 

Besides, if the current slowdown in demand for its vehicles persists, the sales are going to dwindle further. On the other hand, after TVS and Bajaj, Ola Electric is set to face another major competition with the entry of Honda in the electric scooter market.

Following the crisis that Ola Electric saw in 2024, an industry leader said that it is highly likely that the company’s market share will dwindle further to 10% in the next five years.

Meanwhile, its capex is large as the expansion of its “state-of-the-art” gigafactory is in the process. Recently, Aggarwal once again made a bold claim of expanding its distribution network to 4,000 stores from existing 800 outlets in less than 20 days.

While it remains to be seen whether Aggarwal’s company would truly face the crisis many industry veterans are predicting, which could also reverse if the founder decides to stitch in time, many international brokerages are highly bullish on the company’s potential in the long term.

Though Aggarwal and Ola Electric have faced much criticism in recent days, Uday Narang, chairman and founder of Omega Seiki Mobility said that the entire EV industry needs to play a role where safety, quality, and service and cost given to customers are given utmost importance in this shift to sustainable mobility.

“Failures happen but we have to be able to build better products and solutions from those experiences,” said Narang.

Will Aggarwal be able to learn from the failures in 2024 and make Ola Electric a truly valuable company for decades to come for its investors and customers alike?

[Edited By Nikhil Subramaniam]

The post Ola Electric In 2024: Between Bhavish Aggarwal’s Dreams And The Ground Reality appeared first on Inc42 Media.

The demand for radio frequency (RF) chips is rising globally due to their growing applications in defence, the need for faster and more sophisticated telecommunication systems, and increasing satellite communication requirements.

However, much like the broader electronics manufacturing sector, India remains heavily reliant on importing semiconductor chips used in radar systems, 5G telecommunications and similar applications.

Despite its efforts to reduce dependence on imports, India’s imports of electronics, telecom and electrical products soared to a massive $89.8 Bn in FY24, according to a report by the Global Trade Research Initiative (GTRI). Notably, China and Hong Kong accounted for a substantial 56% of India’s total imports in this area. 

The report also suggests that the integrated circuits (ICs) witnessed a significant import surge of 2,415.1% from $166.1 Mn in 2007-2010 to $4.18 Bn between 2020 and 2022.

While it is hard to predict by when India will become semiconductor self-reliant, the burgeoning semiconductor and electronics market does present a promising outlook for the future. 

Amid this, Bengaluru-based fabless semiconductor startup FermionIC Design is among the emerging players aiming to lead this shift (of reducing India’s dependence on imports) in the RF chips market.

Founded in 2020 by Gautam Singh, Prasun Bhattacharyya, Abhra Bagchi and Shabaaz Syed, FermionIC aims to make India self-reliant in the domain of electronics, especially homegrown chips designed for X-band communication for active electronically scanned array (AESA), satellite communication applications, and more. 

Armed with a cumulative experience of over a century, working with Texas Instruments, OnSemi, Cadence, Cosmic Circuits, Qualcomm, Google and other tech giants, the founders aspire to rule over a significant portion of the global RF semiconductor market projected to grow from $50.26 Bn by 2032 from $23.72 Bn in 2024.

Speaking with Inc42, FermionIC’s director and CEO Singh said, “The key driver in the semiconductor industry has always been communication. Whether it’s communication over wires or 5G or SATCOM. There are also other domains like power where people are developing chips for EV charging and others. Our ambition is to build RF chips from India and then serve the global market.”

FermionIC’s Game Plan

As highlighted above, the founders of the semiconductor startup have a cumulative experience of more than 100 years. They are adept at the entire life cycle of silicon development — from ideation of new product development to product delivery.

The startup is currently developing chips that are designed for X-band communication (eight to 12 gigahertz frequency range), which, as per Singh, is witnessing increased usage due to the demand in satcom, maritime surveillance, new-age weather forecasts, and more.

Besides, FermionIC has a portfolio of a few other chips, which include signal integrity chips and clock drivers. Though the RF segment remains the major focus of the company, other general-purpose chips help the startup cater to its customers who also want such auxiliary chips to be placed on top of the RF chips for different functions. 

Meanwhile, FermionIC is building IPs. Its SERDES IP claims to help speed up data transfer between devices, which is crucial for faster communication. However, the startup has no plans to give the licence of its IPs to other chip design companies. 

FermionIC recently raised $6 Mn in a funding round led by Lucky Investment Managers’ Ashish Kacholia and his associates.

Its chips are GaN-based as these wafers make RF chips more efficient. The startup is getting its chips manufactured by GlobalFoundries. 

FermionIC’s Revenue Plan

FermionIC is gearing up to generate revenue. It aims to bring to the market a full-stack IC-product portfolio superior to what the global giants have to offer. Notably, it faces stiff competition from global RF chipmakers like NXP Semiconductors, Qualcomm, and Analog Devices. 

In the four years of its existence, FermionIC dedicated a significant amount of time analysing the market requirements, gaps in existing products and building its beta customer base. The idea is to establish the market in advance so that it doesn’t struggle to sell its chips once its mass production begins.

“We have identified that the existing solutions from the large companies are more generic in nature. There are some performance gaps in these chips and I want to improvise those. The other thing is radars are a very complex system. So, we are trying to solve the performance of our customers – the original design manufacturers (ODMs) – while also bringing down the system design complexity,” Singh said.

FermionIC has started selling its chips in a small volume to its beta customers. Currently, it’s in discussion with its manufacturing partner and plans to begin large-volume production of the chips in three months.

“Our plan is to begin the production cycle by the end of the current fiscal year so that we can start shipping in the first half of next fiscal (FY26),” Singh said, adding the company already has several commitments from its customers.

However, the lead time in this industry is more than 36 weeks, he added. Once the purchase order is fully in place by the end of FY25, FermionIC aims to start generating revenue sometime in the next fiscal. The startup also plans to keep some inventory ready to cut this lead time by half.

The Road Ahead For FermionIC 

The semiconductor industry is not only challenging but also demands patience. So far, FermionIC has only been able to develop its base technology, product, and market. However, in the coming years, it plans to expand its product line to cater to a bigger customer base.

In the short term, they have a wholly-owned US subsidiary on the cards. The startup sees a huge market opportunity in the US, even though the Indian market is expected to be its largest contributor in terms of sales.

Besides the US market, FermionIC is also eyeing Australia and the EMEA region where it plans to expand via partnerships with other companies in the near future. The startup sees at least 10% of its revenue from the global markets. 

Moving on, the company plans to bolster its partnerships in India. For testing and packaging, it has partnered with outsourced semiconductor assembly and testing (OSAT) company, Kaynes Semicon.

FermionIC is also working closely with the Indian government. With its core technology in place, market opportunities largely gauged, and global go-to-market strategy also figured out, it remains to be seen if FermionIC would take up one of the key positions among other startups that are writing India’s semiconductor story.

As of now, the startup seems to have taken a significant step towards making India a semiconductor self-reliant nation, particularly in the critical RF chip segment.

With seasoned industry veterans at its helm, the startup appears well-positioned to make a mark in the competitive semiconductor market by addressing gaps in existing global solutions. 

However, the road ahead is not going to be easy, especially when the larger market is dominated by established players with robust supply chains and significant investments. 

To outdo giants like Qualcomm and NXP Semiconductors, FermionIC will require sustained financial backing and the ability to scale rapidly. Additionally, the heavy reliance on third-party manufacturing partners, like GlobalFoundries, may pose delivery challenges every now and then. 

[Edited By Shishir Parasher]

The post Can FermionIC Outperform Qualcomm, NXP With Its GaN-Based RF Chips? appeared first on Inc42 Media.

At a time when AI adoption is on the rise around the world, India’s large-scale enterprises seem to be trailing behind their global peers. As per Inc42’s The Rise Of India’s GenAI Brigade, Report 2024, 75% of startup investors believe that most large-scale enterprises in India are struggling to convert their AI use cases from proof of concept to organisation-wide deployment.

While this may appear contrary to the image of Indian IT giants said to be riding the GenAI wave, it is only true to some extent. Well, companies like TCS, Wipro, Infosys, and several large banks have indeed adopted AI and GenAI technologies for various internal and external purposes, but their adoption is still slower compared to others.

The findings of Inc42’s latest report also suggest that startups have been more proactive in terms of adopting AI technology, including GenAI, as compared to traditional players. 

In addition, only 30-40% of GenAI proof of concepts by global capability centres (GCCs) and 15-20% by large domestic companies in India are progressing to production. In contrast, 66% of India’s leading unicorns have started integrating GenAI into their offerings. In fact, GenAI adoption has truly become a new normal for Indian startups. 

As part of a survey done by Inc42 that asked more than 50 VC investors about the tech readiness of their non-GenAI portfolio startups in GenAI adoption, 43% said that AI/GenAI is now a key part of their product and service roadmap.

Meanwhile, 27% of these VCs also said that their non-GenAI portfolio startups are already implementing the technology.

Why Are Indian Enterprises Slow In AI Adoption?

It is a known fact that India has been a little late to jump on the GenAI bandwagon — whether it is about companies building foundational models and applications or implementing the tech.

Large enterprises, with their larger teams, established processes, and stricter compliance requirements, naturally face more challenges when adopting new technologies, and this isn’t unique to GenAI.

Commenting on the matter, Vipul Patel, partner (seed investing) at IIMA Ventures, said that Indian enterprises have historically lagged behind their global counterparts in the adoption of technology for workflows during digitisation, cloud migration, and SAAS usage as well.

“Even in the case of GenAI, since the adoption largely depends on the cloud migration and digital transformation of enterprises, Indian enterprises continue to witness a certain lag,” Patel added.

Sahil Chopra, VP of growth and marketing at Inflection Point Ventures, too, noted that enterprises have inherent challenges such as legacy systems, talent shortages, and infrastructure constraints, which have hampered adoption. 

However, Chopra believes these challenges are now being addressed via collaborative efforts in upskilling, modernisation, and strategic investments.

“Indian firms are progressively preparing to adopt the tech, demonstrating their distinctive ability to innovate while facing hurdles with resilience… The rising recognition of GenAI’s revolutionary potential is causing a shift in thinking, aided by government measures aimed at promoting AI use and a healthy startup sector,” he added.

GenAI adoption in enterprises is gaining momentum — slowly but surely. TCS, which uses and develops AI and GenAI-based applications for its clients, has recently launched several platforms to serve various sectors. 

One of its latest innovations is TCS AI WisdomNext, a GenAI aggregator platform designed to help organisations quickly adopt next-gen technologies at lower costs, all while staying compliant with regulatory guidelines.

Reliance is also developing a suite of infrastructure-level AI tools under the brand name JioBrain to allow industry and consumer adoption of the technology. 

But Is The Trend Shifting?

GenAI’s largest enterprise use case currently lies in conversational bots, particularly in sectors like BFSI, ecommerce, and telecom, where there is significant demand for customer support.

For instance, Ganesh Gopalan, the cofounder and CEO of Gnani.ai, which is focussed on transforming the customer experience provided by enterprises, claims that its AI solutions help more than 150 enterprises achieve a revenue impact exceeding $6 Bn.

“I have observed that Indian enterprises aren’t just keeping pace with global enterprises in GenAI adoption but exceeding them in many ways. They seem to be more readily embracing GenAI solutions, likely driven by a keen understanding of the cost efficiencies and productivity gains these technologies offer,” Gopalan said.

According to the founder, this accelerated adoption in the Indian enterprise ecosystem in recent days is due to a modernised technological and infrastructure landscape.  

“Many global enterprises are grappling with legacy systems, while Indian enterprises have undergone a significant digital transformation in recent years,” he added.  

AI-powered equity investment platform InvestorAI, which works with top domestic broking firms, including HDFC Securities, Geojit, JM Financial Services, and Axis Securities, believes that India is better placed than most in terms of businesses adopting GenAI.

So, Will Enterprise Use Cases Rise Soon?

The answer would be unequivocally affirmative. While India’s large-scale enterprises have been slower to adopt GenAI compared to global peers, the tide is gradually shifting. 

Notably, any tech business falling behind in its adoption might also lose relevance in this swiftly changing world. Moving on, with advancements in digital transformation, the rise of AI-driven solutions, and increasing recognition of GenAI’s potential, Indian enterprises have no option but to catch up to their global peers.

Industry experts believe that with regulations around GenAI improving, ethical AI taking centre stage, and the launch of varied applications to solve niche industry-specific or department-specific problems, Indian enterprises will only accelerate the deployment of technology.

Perhaps this promising opportunity is also the reason why 70% of GenAI startups are focussed on building solutions for enterprises today instead of consumer applications, as suggested by Inc42’s report.

As of now, the future looks promising, with significant opportunities for innovation and growth in the GenAI space, especially as the demand for personalised, enterprise-ready applications continues to rise.

[Edited By Shishir Parasher]

The post Why Are Large-Scale Indian Enterprises Lagging Globally In AI Adoption? appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Despite being bestowed with an endless supply of clean energy (sunlight), we have not been able to unlock the full potential of our Sun. While we could blame it on the availability of sunlight, which varies across regions, the truth of the matter is that trapping sunlight to produce power, to this date, has proven to be less efficient than using fossil fuels like coal.

So what’s the alternative? Do we have to rely on fossil fuels until the end of time? Or we could just make our own sun, given that we know it is nuclear fusion that powers the Sun, and end our quest for free energy once and for all.

Globally, scientists have been aspiring to achieve this. However, despite years of research, the world hasn’t been able to attain this success at a commercial scale. Even China’s artificial sun, the Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST), could sustain a nuclear fusion reaction only for 403 seconds last year, breaking its earlier record of 101 seconds at 120 Mn degrees Celsius. 

However, we must not forget that clean energy is emerging as the most promising space globally, with new-age entrepreneurs and deep-pocketed tech investors willing to experiment in the name of the fuel of the future. 

In India, Anubal Fusion is working in this direction and envisions an India that creates an electricity surplus with nuclear fusion at play.

Notably, Anubal Fusion, founded in 2024 by Pravin Kini, claims to be the first Indian startup that is working to develop nuclear fusion technology.

Now, before we understand what drives Kini’s ambitions dream, here’s a snapshot of this professional journey so far.

Kini began his career as a medical doctor in 1988. In 2010, he became an entrepreneur, cofounding Bourn Hall Clinic, the world’s first IVF clinic, during its global expansion.

After selling his stake in Bourn Hall in 2014, Kini was bound by agreements not to enter the IVF space. He pivoted to animal genetics, founding Tropical Animal Genetics and investing in ventures like Jiva Sciences and cybersecurity startup QuNu Labs.

Now, after decades of innovation across sectors, nuclear fusion emerged as Kini’s next big opportunity. In 2024, he founded Anubal to address the world’s growing energy demands sustainably.

Anubal’s Ambitious Dream?

Speaking with Inc42, Kini said that humanity is staring at a major challenge ahead – energy requirements are going to explode in the future, and we are not prepared for it. 

“If urbanisation, space exploration, and other such developments have to continue, our energy requirements will grow at least 10 to 100 times, which requires a more efficient source of energy,” Kini said.

Kini also believes that humankind’s dependence on regular fossil fuels is going to end in the next 10-15 years. However, other forms of renewable sources of energy such as solar or geothermal will not be able to meet the country’s growing power demand. “Therefore, we will be left with two options – nuclear fission or fusion,” he said.

For context, fission is the process in which energy is created when big heavy atoms split into smaller, lighter ones, whereas fusion happens when small atoms combine into bigger ones to produce energy. 

As per the World Nuclear Association, nuclear energy currently provides about 9% of the world’s electricity from about 440 power reactors. 

In 2023, India produced 44.6 terawatt-hours of nuclear electricity, which was significantly lower than the USA, China, Russia, and France, among a few others. 

It is pertinent to note that nations across the globe are currently dependent on nuclear fission to produce nuclear energy with radioactive elements like Uranium, which also makes the entire process highly risky.

The 1986 Chernobyl nuclear accident and the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi disaster, triggered by a natural calamity, serve as stark reminders of the catastrophic risks associated with nuclear fission. In contrast, fusion offers a cleaner, safer alternative. 

Moving on, although developing nuclear fusion energy was so far restricted to the public sector, it has now started changing, creating a promising future for the likes of Anubal. 

Pioneering as a private player in the field, Anubal plans to use a laser to bring two hydrogen atoms together to create fusion.

Not to mention, Anubal is on a road that is not only capital-intensive but also requires a significant amount of support from the government and tech giants.

To kickstart its initial experiments in partnership with the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), the startup recently raised an undisclosed amount in a seed round from Speciale Invest.

“The petawatt laser we require to develop this technology typically costs around INR 1,000 Cr-INR 1,500 Cr, which the government has already spent money on. Most fusion companies worldwide take investments close to about a billion dollars or above in the pre-Series A rounds. But in India, we cannot take that kind of capital. So, we are looking at options, and using our relationship with the governments to make sure this technology works,” Kini said.

Anubal’s Road To Commercialisation 

Currently, Anubal is working on ensuring that all the required agreements are in place, which will be followed by starting simulations and, then, the real experiments will begin.

Kini said that a week to 10 days of experimenting with this technology costs about INR 4 Cr-INR 5 Cr in India. With such a heavy capex, the next steps require proper planning and simulations.

The founder expects the simulation phase alone to take roughly about one to two years. Anubal will be carrying out these simulations at the Department Of Atomic Energy and a few private-sector computer farms, given the startup requires supercomputers.

Once the simulations get accepted, receive good peer review, and are approved by other scientists, Anubal will get into the experiment phase, which again is expected to take two years or more for completion. Once these experiments pass the tests, the startup will then make its way to commercialisation. 

“It would be anywhere between 5 to 10 years to get into the commercialisation phase,” Kini said, adding that people in the private sector have been working on this for the last 2-3 decades but have yet to achieve any commercial success

Where Is Anubal Headed?

As of now, Anubal is fully funded for the simulation phase. However, once the experimental stage begins, it would require at least INR 1,000 Cr of fresh funding. Also, once the technology is validated, Kini believes building a commercial reactor will be relatively straightforward.

While the challenges are aplenty, and even more when it comes to making nuclear fusion commercially viable, the startup is betting on two aspects – the scientific validation of the technology and the increasing push for green energy.

Meanwhile, the development of this tech is moving extremely fast worldwide, so any breakthrough might take place in the next few years of its simulation phase. Whether the breakthrough happens in India or abroad, the developments will only accelerate Anubal’s way to commercialisation.

Now, as the global race for fusion heats up, Anubal’s progress will be closely watched. Focussed on its ambitious plans to revolutionise India’s energy landscape with clean, fusion-powered energy, Anubal Energy could perhaps give India its very own artificial sun.  

[Edited By Shishir Parasher]

The post Is Anubal Fusion’s Artificial Sun The Answer To India’s Energy Crisis? appeared first on Inc42 Media.

As the adoption of GenAI grows in the country, varied applications, draped as horizontal and vertical solutions, are increasingly finding their use cases. Whether conversational tools, speech-to-text/speech-to-speech bots, text summarisation, or video generation, Indian startups seem to be taking charge of paving the future of this ingenious tech in the country

In 2024 alone, several new-age tech startups, including the likes of Highperformr.AI, Ayna, Gnani.ai, Clodura.AI and Vitra.ai, raised funding from investors such as Inflexor Ventures, Info Edge, Venture Highway, and Bharat Innovation Fund, just to name a few. 

However, worth noting is the fact that 91% of the money invested in Indian native GenAI startups to date has gone to companies that are building business or consumer applications around GenAI technology, according to Inc42’s latest report — The Rise Of India’s GenAI Brigade. 

Consequently, foundational solutions like LLMs and cloud infrastructure are seemingly less of a priority for the VC ecosystem. Substantiating this, a recent survey by Inc42 of over 50 VCs has revealed that 62% of the VCs prioritised startups building tools and applications on existing LLMs. Meanwhile, merely 11% see scope for startups in developing domestic open-source foundation models (LLM) and 19% in closed-source foundation models.

This could be because building foundational models is expensive due to the high cost of graphics processing units (GPUs) and other expenses related to managing the infrastructure.  

In fact, earlier this year, many investors highlighted the capex-heavy nature of building a foundational model, making vertical applications a more attractive investment choice.

For instance, Speciale Invest and 100X.VC, two of the leading GenAI investors in the country, stated that their relatively small fund and ticket sizes prevent them from making large investments in startups developing foundational models, which require billions of dollars in funding.

But Is Money The Only Concern?

According to the VP of growth and marketing at Inflection Point Ventures, Sahil Chopra, along with the capital-intensive nature of foundational GenAI models, there are several other reasons why VCs choose investing in the application layer. 

“Applications frequently meet immediate market demands, resulting in quicker ROIs and fewer technical development hurdles. They improve operational efficiency by integrating with current corporate processes and scaling more readily,” Chopra said.

In addition, he said that the startups building GenAI applications have a greater emphasis on user experience and the possibility of strategic alliances, which also increases the appeal of application-layer investments. 

“It also enables entrepreneurs to demonstrate the viability of their GenAI solutions rapidly and more efficiently, he said.

Murali Krishna Gunturu, principal at Inflexor Ventures, too, believes that foundational models face monetisation challenges. According to him, in the presence of platforms like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude bringing out a significant differentiating factor that users would opt for is challenging.

Offering a slightly different perspective, Sonal Saldanha, VP at 3one4 Capital, pointed out that model development faces the challenge of rapid depreciation. She explained that the market is very competitive, and margins are extremely fine, so it is tough to assume one will make money back on the cost of R&D without sustained investment and long-term strategy.

According to Saldanha, like the earlier waves of the Internet and mobile, “infrastructure investments” will be fewer than “application investments.” 

“In this context, applications also have better margin profiles and can be more economical to develop, distribute and establish. Overall the surface area for applications is very large, and this is now turning into the surface area for services as well, which expands the addressable market meaningfully.”

What Lies Ahead?

As of now, while GenAI infrastructure tools such as GPUs, LLMs, and model fine-tuning capabilities are crucial for practical AI applications, less than 5% of funded Indian startups are focussed on developing these foundational tools.

Meanwhile, besides building the foundational model and working with the application layer, there are a few other niche categories that are also getting increased investor focus. 

Interestingly, Inc42’s survey also suggests that 51% of the respondent VCs want Indian entrepreneurs to build products for model fine-tuning. On the other hand, 46% believe there is scope for products in Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG).

“We are seeing domestic companies do interesting R&D work through distillation and fine-tuning, building tooling for ops and observability, building proprietary models for specific applications,” Saldanha said.  

He gave the example of one of its portfolio startups Smallest.ai, which has built a text-to-speech model that generates 10 seconds of audio in 100 milliseconds and uses only 1GB of RAM.

In fact, the small language models (SLMs) are increasingly finding more traction in the market, given they work with smaller datasets and can perform and excel in specific tasks while also keeping the costs lower. 

Recently, Sarvam AI also doubled down on SLMs with the launch of its full-stack GenAI platform. Hemant Mohapatra, partner at Lightspeed, said the VC firm’s rationale behind investing in Sarvam AI stems from its belief that AI in India must be uniquely tailored to the scale and diversity of its population.  

He added that Lightspeed remains open to evaluating other companies building foundational models from any region and investing in the best teams. 

Overall, the investors’ sentiment is clear — while foundational model startups will continue to receive funding, the pace is expected to remain slow. Existing players will remain relevant only if they can consistently innovate and outperform competitors in global markets.

Further, niche areas like SLMs and model fine-tuning are emerging as promising opportunities, which suggests that innovation tailored to India’s unique ecosystem will be key to shaping the next phase of GenAI’s evolution in the country.

[Edited By Shishir Parasher]

The post Why Are Investors Betting on AI Skyscrapers, Not Foundational Models? appeared first on Inc42 Media.

After a blockbuster October due to the festive season boost, most electric two-wheeler manufacturers witnessed a dip in their monthly vehicle registrations in November.

Total registrations declined over 18% month-on-month (MoM) to 1.14 Lakh units last month, as per Vahan data on November 30. On a year-on-year (YoY) basis, registrations rose 23.5%.

Ola Electric, which crossed the 40,000 mark in October, saw its registrations slump 33% MoM to 27,746 units in November. 

The Bhavish Aggarwal-led company has been seeing severe volatility in its vehicle sales in recent months amid rising competition and customer complaints about its after-sales service. 

Ola Electric’s registrations in November were almost at par with August, when the number stood at 27,613 units. However, the registrations last month were higher than 24,736 units in September.

Meanwhile, despite a 13% dip in its sales volume, TVS Motor almost touched Ola Electric’s registration numbers last month. The legacy automotive player’s escooter registrations stood at 26,036 units in November.

While Ola Electric managed to maintain its top position, its market share in the electric two-wheeler market dipped to 24% from about 30% in October. On the other hand, TVS Motor’s market share increased to about 23% in November from 21.5% in the preceding month. 

Bajaj Auto also continued to give tough competition to Ola Electric, with its total vehicle registrations at 24,978 units in November. Even as its monthly sales dipped about 12% MoM, Bajaj posted its second-highest monthly vehicle registrations in November. 

The automotive player claimed almost a 22% market share in November as against about 20% market share in the previous few months.

Meanwhile, IPO-bound Ather Energy saw a little over 24% decline in registrations to 12,217 units last month from 16,148 units in October. Its monthly sales volume was almost close to 12,908 units posted in September this year.

While most electric two-wheeler players’ sales volume dipped last month, electric motorcycle maker Revolt’s vehicle registrations more than doubled, albeit at a much smaller base. Revolt’s registrations stood at 1,918 units in November as against 952 units in the preceding month.

Earlier this year, Revolt also forayed into the Sri Lankan market. In September this year, the EV maker also launched a new bike model Revolt RV1, which it claims to be India’s first electric motorcycle designed for the commuter segment. With price starting at INR 84,990, the ebike poses significant competition to the escooters players.

On the other hand, Greaves and Ampere together posted 4,391 units in vehicle registrations in November, an increase of 9% MoM. Earlier this year, Greaves Electric Mobility launched its first family escooter, Ampere Nexus, marking an important shift in its EV strategy.

However, other electric motorcycle players, including Oben Electric and Ultraviolette saw a major dip in their vehicle registrations in November. While Oben’s volume fell to 50 units from 139 units in October, Ultraviolette’s registrations fell to 27 units in November from 50 units the month before.

Despite the volatility, the size of the electric two-wheeler market is rising steadily. With an eye on giving a further boost to the ecosystem, the Centre is said to be planning to expand incentives to electric automakers building models at existing factories. 

Overall EV registrations, across categories, stood at 1.67 Lakh units in November, increasing 30% year-on-year.

The post Ola’s Market Share Dips To 24% As Electric 2W Registrations Slip In November appeared first on Inc42 Media.

When ideaForge went public in July last year, the drone startup had just recovered from a loss. It posted a profit of INR 18.9 Cr in the June quarter (Q1) of the financial year 2023-24 (FY24) against a loss of INR 5.4 Cr in Q4 FY23, all while cloaking a revenue of around INR 100 Cr in Q1 FY24. 

However, if we analyse the trends, ideaForge has never had a steady growth in the past. A year after its public listing, the same uncertainties loom large. 

After a steady decline in its profitability in three consecutive quarters since the December quarter of last fiscal (Q3 FY24), ideaForge has once again slipped into the red in Q2 FY25. It posted a bigger loss of INR 13.7 Cr compared to what it incurred in Q4 FY23. 

The startup has earlier emphasised multiple times that the drone industry in the country is in its infancy, making the comparison of its quarter-on-quarter financial performance redundant. 

While we take that into consideration, the key question is — how long will it take for the company to be on a steady growth trajectory? Also, is it the lack of market traction, increasing competition, or delay in converting orders that is exposing the company to such uncertainties?

To understand this, we spoke with ideaForge CEO, Ankit Mehta, who said the company has to align expectations with the government’s contract allocation processes that could be tedious and time-straining at times. 

He added that the trend of uncertainties on the financial front is expected to continue, as the business is heavily dependent on large government tenders, even as smaller revenue streams from civil and defence sales do add to its top line. 

Meanwhile, not all is gloomy and the CEO seems to be betting big on the company’s order book and the traction it is witnessing in the domestic and international markets.

Overall, the CEO isn’t ignorant of the pain points of the sector, given it is in its nascent stages, and is parallelly betting on drone-as-a-service (DaaS), which, he said, is getting much traction in the enterprise use cases.

Here are the edited excerpts…

Inc42: Let’s address the elephant in the room. In the past few quarters, ideaForge has witnessed a decline in its bottom line. It also slipped into a loss in Q2 and revenue declined QoQ. What challenges are you facing?

Ankit Mehta: Defence is an opportunity-driven business model. Profitability usually depends on the nature and timing of opportunities we bank on. Large opportunities often take a fair amount of time to close. Once they do, if they are bid competitively, we get about a year to deliver them.

Today, ideaForge is a large contract business. While we have a run rate business, which comes from people buying on the civil side and defence players making regular purchases in smaller quantities, our major business comes from large deals. 

Now, when we deliver large deals, margins may vary based on the type of the deal. However, if you look at the overall opportunity space that we operate in, we have deals in each bucket. 

Things could look plus or minus sometimes, but we don’t expect the situation to be worse than the average you saw last year as an annual number.

Inc42: So, you are saying your opportunities have not diminished. In the earnings call, you mentioned you have a strong deal pipeline. How long will it take for ideaForge to close these deals? Any challenges you foresee?

Ankit Mehta: If you look at emergency procurement, the government takes at least six to nine months to place orders, and then we take about a year to deliver. 

Whenever we bagged an opportunity under this regime, we were able to get it in our favour and deliver on time.

Now, the other mode of large opportunities in the government is conventional capital procurement. These opportunities take anywhere between three to five years to fructify. In some cases, it can take even longer for the opportunity to be released as a request for proposal or RFP, which is a tendering process.

Simply put: The government invites RFP or bids from multiple companies and then evaluates them on the basis of the demonstration of their tech. Once someone meets all requirements, financial discussions open. Finally, the lowest bidder among the ones that qualified gets the contract. This conventional process is very lengthy.

In light of the recent clash in Galwan, the government has come up with a new mechanism to expedite the process. We have already gone through a few cycles of this but still need visibility on it from the government side, which has created a slowdown in order conversion.

We have been through these kind of phases earlier as well. That is why it is more important for us to build a good business that makes superior products so that we can capitalise on the opportunities as and when they come. For example, when Galwan happened, we were the only company that could operate our drones effectively at such high altitudes.

Inc42: What about the non-defence use cases for drones?

Ankit Mehta: There has been strong traction in civil use cases, but the base is still small, so it is taking time for the demand to be reflected in numbers. Also, regulations were much tighter earlier, and it is only recently that companies have started to experiment with drone technology. 

Till the time our revenue base remains small and large deals impact us significantly, things are unlikely to alter much. As of now, we are taking multiple steps to change the current scheme of things.

Inc42: What steps is ideaForge taking to address this?

Ankit Mehta: We are trying to get into more platforms. The government has certain programmes for tactical class UAVs, and we plan to participate. 

Then, there is a need to build something that can carry very heavy payloads, both on the defence and civil fronts. To address this, we are building a logistics platform that can carry 100+ kg of payload to 100+ kms, even at high altitudes. So, building more platforms and diversifying the number of systems we offer will allow us to participate in more opportunities. 

We are also taking our technology abroad. Across all categories, we have the best-performing products in the world. Since we are taking our premium offerings abroad, they would take time to be absorbed in the market. Despite this, we’ve had some phenomenal success in demonstrating the capabilities in real-world scenarios.

One of our customers was part of an early adopters programme in the US, and with our tech, they were able to catch murder suspects by hovering around a house. 

Previously, the drones they deployed could stay in the air only for 5-10 minutes because of battery constraints. However, our technology allows them to stay in the air for 30-45 minutes.

All this is built without any critical subsystems coming from any country of concern. This has become a big thing in India as well.

In addition, we have been experimenting with drone-as-a-service (DaaS) and witnessing a lot of traction in the enterprise use cases for our DaaS, which will see further expansion next year. We have also started getting into software-as-a-service as a use case.

Inc42: Aren’t you already facing stiff competition in the US? Also, what about domestic competition, given there are so many drone startups that have come up with more advanced tech?

Ankit Mehta: Interestingly, in the global tech arena, it is not always the conventional players who lead the race. For example, ideaForge was the first company globally to capitalise on defence use for surveillance with our portable capabilities.

However, this has not been without challenges. For example, when you go to a new market, you realise that their consumption pattern is different from the technology you have built. Then it takes time to build new hardware to meet their needs. 

We recently launched a new product, Q6 V3, in the US because when we went there, we got some very specific feedback, which we had to incorporate into the existing product. 

While that is one thing, entering other countries allows you to deploy products worldwide because these countries cater to a lot of demand from the rest of the world.

Coming to the domestic competition, I think ideaForge has been able to maintain the kind of cutting-edge technology that we deliver to our customers. 

For instance, nobody makes a 90-minute quadcopter anywhere. While many people claim a lot, we have tested some of these products and found that the performance they claim is not the same in the real world. Besides, building it all on Indian tech is an exception.

Inc42: When will ideaForge see a turnaround in its financials?

Ankit Mehta: We stay away from giving projections because, as I mentioned, it becomes a little tricky, given that our performance is often dependent on external events. The moment we have visibility, we will talk about it. At this point, making projections will be a bit counterproductive.

Edited By Shishir Parasher

The post ideaForge CEO On Why The Company Slipped Into Losses In Q2 FY25 appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Today, the real-world impact of GenAI is more tangible than ever. From banks, insurance companies and hospitals to content and legal firms, GenAI applications are becoming mainstream, enhancing workflows, research, sales, customer service, and more.

Earlier this year, Inc42 predicted that the growing enterprise adoption of GenAI in 2024 would pave the way for a new generation of entrepreneurs, who can address India-specific vertical challenges, shifting from the global horizontal approach. This vision is quickly taking shape and creating new opportunities for industry-focussed GenAI startups to secure funding from venture capitalists.

Notably, vertical solutions are designed to cater to industry-specific requirements while horizontal GenAI solutions are sector-agnostic. An industry-specific case in point is OnFinance, which is a GenAI SaaS solutions provider for the financial sector. Similarly, GenAI platforms such as Boltzmann and immunitoAI are developing solutions focussed on healthtech. 

In fact, 84% of Indian VCs today prefer industry-focussed startups over general-purpose solutions, Inc42’s recent report, ‘The Rise Of India’s GenAI Brigade Report, 2024’, has revealed. 

With the proliferation of infrastructure-level, horizontal solutions led by global players, Indian investors want homegrown GenAI businesses to offer niche, sector-specific solutions.

In the last one year of thoroughly tracking new trends in the GenAI arena, what we have known is that investors are betting big on the rising traction of this tech in areas like fintech, enterprise SaaS, and healthtech. Inc42’s latest research also suggests that Indian investors’ top choice for vertical AI solutions is fintech, followed by healthcare and manufacturing.

Notably, as many as 57% of the 50 venture capital investors surveyed by Inc42 showed the highest confidence in the fintech sector for vertical GenAI solutions.

So, What Is Making Vertical GenAI A Compelling Story?

Well, the answer to this key question is in the country’s ability to create differentiated products in a crowded market. Speaking with Inc42, Murali Krishna Gunturu, principal at Inflexor Ventures, said that general-purpose AI is already being solved by platforms like OpenAI’s ChatGPT. So, according to him, if in today’s time, a startup develops a ChatGPT clone or wrapper, it would be difficult to monetise.

“The solutions that startups develop must have individual moats, and a strong moat is extremely important for VCs to invest in a startup, which can be better created with a focus on building solutions around a specific industry or vertical,” Gunturu said.

Inflexor has so far invested in two GenAI startups – Ayna and Vitra.ai. While Vitra.ai has a horizontal approach, Ayna is building solutions to particularly solve photography bottlenecks in ecommerce. A few other vertically focussed startups that raised funding this year include Febi.ai and jhana.ai. 

While the interest among investors to inject money into horizontal use cases is not waning, as seen with recent investments in Neysa, Devnagri, CoRover, and others, the differentiator lies in keeping investors engaged and on their toes.

Vipul Patel, partner (seed investing) at IIMA Ventures highlighted that the significant development of general-purpose solutions has now proven to be a launchpad for industry-focussed GenAI solutions. 

“Vertical solutions require access to industry or use-case specific quality data and building smaller models. The combination of both has a potential for creating a decent moat for the business is gaining investors’ interest,” Patel said.

Interestingly, Sonal Saldanha, vice president at 3one4 Capital, who also leads the GenAI investments in the VC firm, has a slightly different perspective. 

Emphasising that 3one4 Capital has no strict boundaries when investing (vertical or horizontal), he said that general-purpose solutions like code editing, document management, call transcription, objectives and key results (OKR) management and recruiting will exist. However, the sheer TAM of work automation is larger, and these will be more verticalised to deliver better results. Therefore more investment interest is here.

“AI companies offer products that enable workflows and deliver output. It’s easier to be precise with the output and create user delight when the solution is more focussed/personalised to the user persona,” he said.

Meanwhile, Gunturu added that more nuanced enterprise use cases and their increasing demand could also be one of the driving factors behind this trend.

Are GenAI Startups Steering Towards Enterprise Use Cases?

According to Inc42’s recent report, as many as 70% of GenAI startups are offering solutions only for enterprise clients, and the remaining 30% are building for consumers and individual creators.

This trend reflects a strategic shift among Indian GenAI startups, driven by the dominance of global players like OpenAI and Anthropic in the consumer application space. Instead of competing in the crowded consumer market, domestic startups are now prioritising localised, enterprise-grade solutions.

This focus is not only enhancing the monetisation potential for Indian GenAI startups but also making them more attractive to VCs by addressing complex, nuanced challenges.

Speaking on the matter, Ganesh Gopalan, cofounder and CEO of Gnani.ai said that his startup is focussed on the enterprise sector because he believes in the potential of enterprise use cases for enabling a transformative impact at scale. 

“We work with enterprises in transforming their customer experiences because they often have complex challenges that are well-suited to the capabilities of GenAI,” Gopalan said, adding that Indian enterprises are accelerating the adoption of GenAI solutions.

Gnani.ai has most of its clients in the BFSI space with several others in automotive, retail, and healthcare. Its clients include the likes of Bajaj Group, TVS Credit, Muthoot Finance, and Fibe (formerly Early Salary).

Per IIMA Ventures’ Patel, enterprise customers are emerging as better targets than individual users in the GenAI market, as their intent to pay for a dependable quality solution is relatively higher. 

On a similar note, 3one4 Capital’s Saldanha said that enterprises today want to be innovators and have carved out budgets to improve their productivity (lower cost, increase revenue), and enhance their product offerings with AI. This is leading to increased AI adoption on the enterprise level. 

“However, not every product is designed to be enterprise-ready because of their customisation expectations, security/compliance requirements, and long sale cycles… as investors we are looking at the startup’s team, the product, and the go-to-market holistically to decide what makes sense as a strategy in that instance,” Saldanha added.

What’s Next In The GenAI Adoption Race?

Many global tech leaders and innovators have touted the wave of GenAI as bigger than the internet revolution. While India has been a bit late to the party, it is trying to make up for the loss by spearheading innovations and trends in the sector. Supporting this thesis is the Centre’s policy push for AI, which also seems to be in line with the sector.

However, the lack of skilled talent continues to be one of the biggest challenges for Indian GenAI startups. According to a recent Amazon Web Services (AWS) survey, 79% of Indian businesses found it challenging to acquire AI talent that met their expectations. 

Moreover, Inc42’s latest research reveals that 84% of Indian VCs believe the recent GenAI investment boom is driven by the fear of missing out, a trend that could potentially harm the ecosystem in the long run. For context, startup funding in native Indian GenAI startups has surged 4.4X in 2024 from 2020.

At a time when GenAI seems to be setting the tone for further developments at the enterprise level, it would be interesting to see vertical use cases take centre stage to dominate this market going forward.

[Edited By Shishir Parasher]

The post Why Indian VCs Are Banking On Vertical GenAI Startups Over General-Purpose Solutions appeared first on Inc42 Media.

If you are a drone enthusiast, you might wonder whether drones can fly without GPS. The answer to this is simple — yes, they can. Using advanced cameras equipped with visual sensors, it is possible to fly drones seamlessly without GPS. 

But, do we really need such a tech? Well, the answer to this, too, is affirmative, as drone users often face communication challenges, especially in the case of beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). 

While GPS-enabled drones are prone to losing control and facing attacks (either due to unfavourable weather conditions or signal jammers), posing a threat to any mission, drones without GPS solve this problem.

At a time when GPS-enabled drones are in use worldwide, there has been an increased focus on building drones with powerful visual sensors and AI-enabled software that can travel with little hiccoughs and as efficiently as other drones. 

In 2018, Besta Prem Sai, an IIT Delhi alumnus, started researching to find an alternative to GPS drones. Today, Sai is the cofounder and CEO of Vecros Drones, a drone tech startup building non-GPS autonomous drones or GPS-denied drones. The startup is also making printed circuit boards (PCBs) for these drones.

The global drone market opportunity is expected to grow at a CAGR of 25% to surpass $166 Bn by 2031, and Vecros is focussed on making superior hardware and software from India for the world. 

However, while the market opportunity is immense, the ethical concerns cannot be ignored — especially when the defence application of drones is on the rise.

Besides, global military powers are finding ways to deploy these vehicles in GPS-denied areas to wage war. The ongoing Russia-Ukraine war is a noteworthy example.

Speaking with Inc42, Sai said his engagement with drone technology was merely out of interest. As he was tinkering with the hardware aspects of drones, a professor brought up the pressing issue of communication challenges that GPS-enabled drones face.

Recognising a huge market opportunity, Sai, along with his friend (who later exited the company due to personal reasons), founded Vecros Drones in 2018. They also received a few grants from IIT to pursue this. 

Vecros Drones’ Early Flight

It was not until 2021 that the startup began its operations. This was also the year when Vecros secured the first round of funding.

“Initially, we started to write software, but the problem was that drone manufacturers did not have advanced hardware that our software could support. So, we thought of building a drone that could completely ditch GPS,” Sai said, explaining how Vecros finally took off.

After receiving its first cheque of INR 25 Lakh from 100X.VC in late 2020, Vecros raised some more angel funding in 2021. With INR 1 Cr investment in hand, the founder, Sai, started building the complete drone stack (software + hardware), and the byproduct was a drone that would capture data using cameras and LiDAR sensors. The same year, Rajashree Deotalu, a robotics researcher, joined as the cofounder and CTO of Vecros.

Years later, the founders take pride in building drones on the simultaneous localisation mapping (SLAM) principle, which has helped their drones fly seamlessly without GPS.

“With the help of SLAM, we have made our drone intelligent enough to create a real-time map of its surroundings, like how we humans do, and route its own path from the start to an endpoint, navigation through the obstacles and finding safe spots to get into a mission,” Deotalu said.

So far, Vecros has built only one drone model, Athera, powered by its proprietary AI-enabled software, JETPIX. The startup has raised around INR 4.5 Cr in total funding from Rebalance, OTP Venture Partners, and angel investors, including boAT’s Aman Gupta in Shark Tank. It has 10 technology patents under its belt.

Vecros’ Tech Stack

There are a few aspects of Vecros’ tech stack – the hardware part, which includes drones and PCBs (JETCORE), and JETPIX, which is significantly modernised with computer vision that enables fail-safe path planning.

The startup makes its drones in-house, which are 3D printed with a few sub-components like propellers and motors imported. It uses NVIDIA’s graphics processing unit (GPU) to power the advanced software capabilities of flying without GPS.

While Vecros has also used off-the-shelf PCBs, its in-house circuit boards are more compact and lightweight and better synchronised with the hardware it is building.

Vecros claims that its first product, Athera, is capable of carrying a 2 kg payload and has a 35-minute flight capability, providing 360-degree obstacle sensing and 5 cm position accuracy.

With GenAI capabilities integrated into its software, Vecros Drones also supports voice commands. From takeoff and navigation to capturing specific data, one can make its drones do most of the work via voice commands. 

Currently, the startup is building a battery management system (BMS). It also claims to offer hot swapping. With Vecros’ technology support, users can call back the drones when required, swap the old battery and redeploy them on the field. 

“An in-house BMS, along with battery swapping, not only reduces safety challenges but also costs for users,” the cofounders said. 

Vecros Sets Coordinated For Tomorrow

As of now, the startup plans to deploy its drones across three sectors primarily – construction, warehouses, and defence. 

While it is true that the ethical concerns remain, drones, in general, pose this concern. Like any other new technology, this, too, remains a grey area and depends on its use or abuse.

Moving on, the startup largely works with B2B clients. It has yet to receive Type certification for its drones, which currently hinders its path to generating a steady source of revenue.

However, Sai claimed that Vecros has started generating revenue from various pilot projects it’s carrying out by providing drone-as-a-service (DaaS).

Given that the company is building a wide range of products and solutions, it is expected to have multiple revenue streams, including DaaS, selling drones as products, and selling PCBs separately. In fact, the startup plans to sell its drone components and software as separate autonomous kits to other drone manufacturers.

Currently, getting certification is the most crucial puzzle that will add commercial value to Vecros’ technology. With the expectation to slove this soon, the startup aims to start selling its drones by the mid of next year.

According to Sai, the startup is looking to sell around 100 drones and at least 10,000 PCBs separately by the end of next year. 

Besides, it is in the process of building its next drone, Jasper. The startup is also building a drone dock where drones can fly in, recharge, and fly back. By 2026, Vecros has plans to set foot in the US and raise around $2 Mn.

Meanwhile, the startup is confident that amid the little risk-taking appetite of the existing drone players, who largely work with outdated legacy software, Vecros will bring a breakthrough in the world of drones.

However, for that to happen, the startup needs to start generating revenues to chart and sustain its future roadmap.

[Edited By Shishir Parasher]

The post How This Startup Plans To Dominate International Skies With GPS-Defying Drones appeared first on Inc42 Media.