Here are India's Biggest AI Startups Based on Funding

In India, the AI startup ecosystem is growing rapidly, despite funding constraints compared to the US and Europe. However, local startups are solving unique problems and creating innovative solutions for the Indian market.

Some Indian startups are integrating local language support into their AI models to cater to the growing demand from Indian consumers. Others, such as Pepper Content and Pocket FM, are leveraging AI to create use cases for markets beyond India and entering the US market.

According to Tracxn data, funding for AI startups in India dropped by nearly 80% in 2023 to $113.4 million from $554.7 million in 2022. In contrast, AI startup funding in the US grew by 211% to $16.2 billion last year from $5.2 billion in 2022.

Dev Khare, a partner at Lightspeed Venture Partners India, believes that India has opportunities for AI in consumer applications, such as creating content in Indic languages, offering virtual influencers, or creating short videos and games using AI.

In the last 18 months, Lightspeed India and SEA has invested over $150 million in AI, including new investments and follow-ons in existing AI-enabled startups. Globally, the fund has invested more than $1 billion across over 70 companies in AI in the same period.

Indian AI Startups that Have Raised the Most Money

Krutrim

Founder: Bhavish Aggarwal Total funding raised: $50 million Key investors: Matrix Partners India

Krutrim, founded by Ola founder Bhavish Aggarwal, is India's first unicorn AI startup, valued at $1 billion on just $50 million of funding raised. Launched in December 2023 in Bengaluru, Krutrim is building a large language model (LLM) based on Indian languages and English.

Sarvam AI

Founders: Vivek Raghavan and Pratyush Kumar Total funding raised: $41 million Key investors: Lightspeed Venture Partners, Peak XV Partners, and Khosla Ventures

Sarvam AI, co-founded by Vivek Raghavan and Pratyush Kumar, is working on LLMs based on Indian languages. The startup emerged from stealth in December and aims to offer full-stack generative AI offerings, including a platform to let enterprises develop GenAI apps based on Sarvam's LLM and contribute to open source models and datasets.

Mad Street Den

Founders: Ashwini Asokan and Anand Chandrasekaran Total funding raised: $57.4 million Key investors: Avatar Growth Capital, Sequoia Capital, and Alpha Wave Global

Mad Street Den is a computer vision startup building AI solutions for enterprise customers. The Chennai-based startup, co-founded by neuroscientist-designer couple Ashwini Asokan and Anand Chandrasekaran, initially introduced its vision tech for the retail segment, but has expanded to verticals including finance, insurance, healthcare, and logistics.

Wysa

Founders: Jo Aggarwal and Ramakant Vempati Total funding raised: $25 million Key investors: HealthQuad, W Health, British International Investment, and Google Assistant Fund

Wysa is a mental health tech startup that uses AI to offer an "emotionally intelligent" therapist chatbot that helps users talk through their feelings. Managed by Wysa's mental health professionals, the chatbot is used by over 6.5 million people across more than 95 countries and diverse age groups.

AndroGuider Team

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