India's digital economy, public infrastructure and security
Startup write-ups, features and analysis written by the bharat.digital desk. Every piece lists its sources.
The Bengaluru defence startup unveiled a static prototype of FWD Supreme, a 1.5 tonne autonomous combat aircraft, in New Delhi. The specs, the funding gap and what still has to fly.
The Hyderabad robotics startup's PR-OMNI is a wheeled semi-humanoid with two 7-axis arms, force sensing in every joint and teleoperation for training. What it is, who backs it and what is still unproven.
The Chennai startup, formerly Torus Robotics, makes high-efficiency electric motors for two- and three-wheelers and industrial machines. Its pivot says a lot about a gap in India's EV supply chain.
The Ahmedabad startup's TAPAS-1 flew on SpaceX's Transporter-18. It wants to measure urban heat, landfill fires and crop stress from space, and says it has about $52 million in letters of intent.
The data protection law arrives in three phases between November 2025 and May 2027. What each phase covers, the dates that matter for businesses, and where to read the full text for free.
The Bengaluru startup raised Rs 200 Cr with the National Quantum Mission as a co-lead. What it sells, why the timing matters, and what the round is meant to pay for.
The Gurugram adtech company's all cash deal for the Nasdaq listed firm adds connected TV, retail media and billboard advertising in North America to Affle's mobile business, with a go shop window open until December 11.
The Greenko founders' AI infrastructure company has about 29,000 Rubin GPUs on order for India and Malaysia, and is now lining up loans, bonds and an equity round to pay for them.
The forensic report on the Czech subsidiary fraud found impersonation and a fake confidential deal, not a hack. It could neither confirm nor rule out the voice cloning the company first described.
The draft framework, built with iSPIRT, would let startups train models on hospital, bank and government data inside sealed compute rooms. It is not binding yet, and the hard questions on payment and liability are still open.
A 0.4% MDR on merchant UPI payments above Rs 2,000 will touch only about 4% of transactions. Pine Labs says more than 65% of its UPI value sits above that line, and it plans 10 lakh more soundboxes.
We tallied every round in Inc42's weekly funding tables from late August to late October. AI startups closed one in six deals, mostly small and early.
The Mumbai startup pays for solar, storage and efficiency projects at commercial and industrial sites and uses its own AI tools to underwrite and monitor them. The new money goes into deploying more assets and moving into battery storage and smaller businesses.
The listing says the access reaches millions of order records plus employee, vendor and payment data. No outlet has been able to verify it, and the electronics retailer has not responded.
The agency says proceeds of the All Panel Exchange betting and cyber fraud racket passed through mule accounts, shell firms and a Bengaluru credit society account opened for Dash's company before being turned into cryptocurrency.
Indian nationals with e-passports flying Air India and select IndiGo routes can now use the face based boarding app at terminal entry, security and boarding gates in Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai, Cochin and Amritsar until December.
The month-long campaign runs across 2,000 cities and districts with banks, post offices, UIDAI and MeitY, and aims for 1.5 crore certificates generated by a face scan on a phone.
Launched on EPFO's 74th Foundation Day, the WhatsApp channel shows balances and the last five transactions, while Aadhaar-verified inoperative accounts holding up to Rs 1,000 will be paid out without a claim.
The regulator says the depository left data loss prevention incomplete, patched vulnerabilities late and ran a VAPT that did not cover all its applications. It is CDSL's second Rs 1 Cr penalty this year.
Prime Venture Partners led the seed plus round. The founders now say the hard part is not a human sounding bot but getting it through a bank's compliance review.
Neon Fund led the pre-seed round as the Bengaluru and Houston startup opened Epsilon, the first version of its hardware design agent, to engineers.
The consumer-focused investor did not disclose the size of the deal. Glance wants to move shoppers from inspiration to checkout on phones and TVs without a search box.
The Bengaluru voice AI startup says the model already runs inside a calling stack that handles more than a million customer calls a day.
Founded by a former Robinhood product manager, the startup plans to launch its app in November 2026, subject to regulatory licensing.
The Ahmedabad startup, founded by a former ISRO scientist, ran on customer programmes for three years before this first outside round.
The partners announced the programme on October 28 but have not yet said when it launches, what it costs or how many points it earns.
The digital lender and the Canadian fintech for cleantech firm want households to find a solar installer and the loan to pay for it in one digital journey.
The second round of the Technology Adoption Fund takes the number of backed companies to seven. Money will flow in stages against milestones.
The Delhi startup founded by Saurav Jha and former DRDO scientist V Ramanujachari has no revenue yet and is looking at testing services while it works toward flight hardware.
Browsers distrusted the Bengaluru certifying authority's ECC root within days. In India, a MeitY probe and a CERT-In advisory are so far the only official responses.
The San Francisco company will collect real world data to train and test robots and other machines, with backing from the same investors behind Pronto.
The Y Combinator backed startup, which works with hospitals in India, the US, Brazil and Argentina, says it has access to more than 100 million de-identified patient records.
The Jaipur lender says its own systems are unaffected. The group calling itself ScarlettGroup claims KYC, PAN, Aadhaar and loan records, which no outlet has been able to verify.
The Mumbai fan and appliance maker grew FY26 revenue 34.8% to Rs 1,293.77 crore but posted a Rs 148.88 crore loss, and plans to put Rs 100 crore of the fresh money into R&D.
The Bengaluru AI inference infrastructure startup says its annualised revenue run rate grew 14x in six months, and will use the all-primary round to expand in North America.
The Naukri parent announced the handover alongside Q2 FY27 results in which AI and data products reached an annualised revenue run rate of about Rs 240 Cr.
The Pune healthtech company, bootstrapped for eight years, is valued at Rs 600 Cr and plans a UAE-led push into Africa, the US and Southeast Asia.
The Rs 4,350 Cr plan, funded from operating cash flows, aims to add about 6 Pbps of capacity between FY30 and FY36, starting with the Mumbai, Pune, Hyderabad and Chennai corridor.
The Gurugram B2B manufacturing startup is valued at Rs 430 Cr after a mix of primary and secondary deals; filings show Rs 46.28 Cr of fresh capital.
Operating revenue rose 11.4% to Rs 40,475 Cr, ARPU reached Rs 218.8 and the customer base crossed 542 million, two days after a record stock market debut.
Blume Ventures and South Park Commons led the round. The Bengaluru company has bought AI radiology tool Medsee and says it has run 10,000 whole body scans.
The Bengaluru company, which counts Swiggy, Delhivery and Flipkart among its clients, plans to build its own inference layer and small language models for workforce tasks.
The Bengaluru deeptech company will reach banks, government, defence and telecom buyers through the cybersecurity distributor's channel partners and system integrators, six weeks after launching the platform.
The Technology Development Board will back the Navi Mumbai startup's Rs 277.63 Cr project through optionally convertible debt from the RDI Fund. Inc42 separately reports a fresh Rs 22 Cr equity raise, citing filings.
The logistics company's operating revenue crossed Rs 3,000 Cr for the September quarter. It also raised its target for intracity service Delhivery Local and said AI automation has halved some support costs.
The state cabinet approved a 24x7 centre to watch government networks, applications and data, and gave the IIT Kanpur cybersecurity hub three years to set it up and operate it.
The Gurugram company behind Policybazaar and Paisabazaar grew operating revenue 35% to Rs 2,178 Cr in the September quarter, while the insurance regulator weighs changes to the commissions its business depends on.
The Bengaluru logistics company's operating revenue rose 57% to Rs 1,538 Cr in the September quarter, its sixth straight quarter of growth above 55%, and it now plans routes for its truck network with an in-house AI system.
The Bengaluru social gaming startup says 2.2 million people played 48 million math, memory, logic and puzzle games on its app in September, and it is building an AI tool that lets users make their own games.
The Bengaluru defence tech startup builds the perception layer for unmanned aircraft, rovers and boats, so they can keep working when GPS and radio links are jammed.
Regulatory filings show the fintech issued preference shares to a Prosus subsidiary, closing the deal first announced in August and giving Prosus an 8.59% stake ahead of Navi's planned IPO.
The listed trucking platform earned Rs 41.4 Cr in the September quarter, with FASTag tolling and telematics still the core and its newer freight and lending lines growing faster.
A Rs 20.9 Cr loss in Q2 FY27 reflects lower fee income, the cost of a core banking migration and a payments vertical that earned nothing this quarter, while loan referrals for its planned small finance bank grew almost fourfold.
Three years after Info Edge wrote off its stake, the B2B retail platform has rebranded, raised a round led by Sparrow Capital and says half its dark stores now break even.
The Kerala startup, which turns atmospheric carbon dioxide into oxygen using microalgae systems, is the first from the state to get money from the IITM Unicorn Frontier Fund.
Operating revenue rose 24% to Rs 806.2 crore. The payments company says most of its UPI value comes from payments above Rs 2,000, the line where NPCI's new merchant fee will apply.
The Mumbai digital lender's operating revenue rose 44.7% to Rs 731.8 crore, bad loans fell, and it raised its full-year AUM growth guidance to over 60%.
The Bengaluru B2B manufacturer, which localises critical components for energy, defence, aerospace and space customers, is setting up its own prototyping and machining facility.
The Bengaluru threat intelligence company will pick 10 early-stage cybersecurity startups for Launchpad, each eligible for up to $5,000 in AI model credits routed through its new KeyVigil gateway.
The Bengaluru cross-border payments company plans a multi-currency account that lets Indian exporters hold foreign currency instead of converting it on arrival.
The AI-led CPA and bookkeeping firm, profitable on a $1.5 Mn pre-seed round, picks up about 100 staff and a base of non-tech US small businesses in an all-cash asset deal.
Now called PhonePe Appstore and present on more than 200 million devices, the Google Play rival is adding gift cards, top-ups and a browser-based webstore.
The Bengaluru spacetech company's new US arm will chase civilian, defence and intelligence contracts, building on existing work with NASA and the National Reconnaissance Office.
The Nasdaq-listed SaaS company is folding the Israeli startup's root-cause engine into its IT service management platform. Terms were not disclosed.
The IIT Madras Research Park startup designs motors, controllers and firmware as one unit for EVs, drones and robots, and is heading into pilot production.
The Odisha deeptech startup's bridge round, led by MGF Kavachh, funds a Rs 66 crore iDEX order and more R&D on its Jalasimha ROV.
The Hyderabad physical AI startup wants factories and warehouses to add self-driving skills to equipment they already own.
About 20 doctor users contributed nearly Rs 3 crore of the round, alongside Vineeta Singh and Avnish Anand.
The Hyderabad space startup is building a 550 W argon electric thruster for satellites of 200 to 500 kg.
The Pune startup raised a $750K pre-seed round from Capital-A and has built a 100 m linear motor test track for port automation.
The Hyderabad startup, backed by Anand Mahindra and Arali Ventures, uses cameras and blue lasers to kill weeds without chemicals.
The Hubballi startup's prototype pod carries four people at about 30 km/h, with a 60 km/h demonstration planned.
The Ahmedabad launch startup flew Gujarat's first sounding rocket in March and has finished landing legs for Infinity One.
The Pune startup's actuator handled 5 kN loads. Its vertical takeoff and landing test flight has slipped to early 2027.
The IIT Kanpur spin-out's 22 kg robot rolls at about 18 km/h on flat ground and walks over stairs and slopes.
The IISc and ARTPARK spin-out says its robot carries up to 40 kg and has more than 80% Indian content by cost.
The RV College of Engineering team has tested its robots at Kengeri and Madiwala lakes and is now seeking municipal pilots.
The Kerala startup's 11 kg robot climbs a 20 m tree in under a minute. A fully automatic AI version is in development.
The Bengaluru specialty chemicals startup uses an AI platform to move from a customer order to finished material in as little as two months.
The Chennai launch startup says the long-duration test brings its Agnibaan rocket closer to its next flight.
The Chennai startup's e-POD prototype targets a June 2027 launch at about Rs 2.5 lakh, with a battery subscription option.
The interceptor is designed as the hard-kill layer of an AI battle management system called GRID.
The startup's 11-stage system has recovered more than 65 crore litres, according to NITI Aayog, and runs India's first indirect potable reuse project.
The Bengaluru startup's process bonds commingled plastics into a wood-like composite without water or heavy heat, and won a Climate-KIC grant.
The Pune electric bus maker has won thousands of buses in central tenders against Tata Motors and Ashok Leyland.
The Bengaluru deeptech startup, led in its seed round by Shastra VC, wants to make short-wave infrared vision cheap enough for drones, robots and phones.
The Bessemer-backed mobile app security startup is buying a majority stake in AIShield through new and existing shares. Bosch keeps a minority stake and no deal value was disclosed.
The Bengaluru startup, founded by a former slice executive, uses AI agents to build enterprise software and says it already serves more than 100 companies.
The Bengaluru startup pairs a language model with a rules based quant engine, so the same question on the same data always returns the same answer.
The Y Combinator-backed startup, led in its seed round by CoinFund, wants Indians to fund trades over UPI and track profit and loss in rupees. It has not launched publicly yet.
The Bengaluru startup's pre-Series B, led by IvyCap Ventures, mixes fresh capital with a secondary sale. It says 90% of its revenue comes from outside India.
The Bengaluru startup's Series B was led by Dallas Venture Capital, with Nvidia among the backers. Its pitch is cheaper, more controllable AI inference.
Chiratae Ventures led the round. The startup already sells an optical Ising machine and is targeting early quantum processors by 2027.
Vertex Ventures SEA & India led the Series B. The company pairs its platform with field engineers who stay with each deployment.
