India’s IT industry apex body, Nasscom, announced the selection of 37 startups for the second cohort of its ‘Generative AI Foundry’ programme, with 30 percent of the chosen startups having women on their founding teams. The selected startups include companies like Fluid AI, Sivi, DaveAI, and OnFinance, among others.
The average startup in this cohort is two years old and has already secured $750,000 in institutional funding. Ankit Bose, Head of AI at Nasscom, emphasized that homegrown Generative AI startups are revolutionizing industries not only within India but globally, highlighting the country’s growing expertise in AI.
Chosen from a pool of over 130 applicants, these startups are pushing the limits of Generative AI , offering solutions that span across text, audio, code, video, image, and multimodal generation. They target key sectors such as retail, banking, financial services, healthcare, and life sciences, with applications extending to various enterprise functions.
The Generative AI Foundry programme, which launched in October 2023, has already supported 26 startups and partnered with nearly 60 enterprises and investors. Startups in the programme have seen significant growth, doubling their business output and increasing headcount by 50 percent, collectively raising $15 million in funding and poised to raise an average of $2 million.
With over 40 patents filed and more in progress, these startups are generating substantial intellectual property from India. Currently, more than 200 tech startups are innovating with Generative AI, serving diverse industry verticals.
According to a recent Nasscom-Zinnov report, deep tech funding exceeded $500 million in 2023. However, Nasscom noted that to further enhance the GenAI startup ecosystem, efforts must focus on fostering collaboration between startups and industry, ensuring access to affordable GPUs, patient capital, applied research, and strengthening the talent pipeline.
