India’s new economy is no longer confined to consumer internet companies. Clean energy, electric mobility, enterprise software, drones, artificial intelligence and data infrastructure are emerging as important engines of investment and innovation.
Women are playing a significant role in this shift. The 2026 Candere Hurun India Women Leaders List identifies 10 women associated with new-economy companies carrying a combined valuation of Rs 47,100 crore.
ReNew co-founder Vaishali Nigam Sinha leads the ranking with a company valuation of Rs 22,230 crore. She is followed by Rajoshi Ghosh of Hasura, valued at Rs 9,500 crore, and Prukalpa Sankar of Atlan, valued at Rs 7,120 crore.
The ranking also reflects the growing commercial footprint of electric mobility and drones. Zypp Electric, Garuda Aerospace, Kinetic Green, BotLab Dynamics and Oben Electric account for five of the 10 positions.
At 33, Garuda Aerospace co-founder Rithika Mohan is the youngest woman in Hurun’s inaugural dedicated ranking of new-economy women leaders.
| Rank | Name | Age | Company | Company Valuation (INR Cr) | Industry |
| 1 | Vaishali Nigam Sinha | 56 | ReNew Power | INR 22,230 Cr | Solar Energy |
| 2 | Rajoshi Ghosh | 39 | Hasura | INR 9,500 Cr | Cloud Computing |
| 3 | Prukalpa Sankar | 36 | Atlan | INR 7,120 Cr | Data Analytics & BI |
| 4 | Rashi Agarwal | 55 | Zypp Electric | INR 3,150 Cr | Urban Mobility & Ride-Hailing |
| 5 | Rithika Mohan | 33 | Garuda Aerospace | INR 2,380 Cr | Drones & Unmanned Aerial Vehicles |
| 6 | Sulajja Firodia Motwani | 42 | Kinetic Green Energy & Power Solutions | INR 1,480 Cr | Electric Vehicles (EV) |
| 7 | Sarita Ahlawat | – | BotLab Dynamics | INR 490 Cr | Drones & Unmanned Aerial Vehicles |
| 8 | Madhumita Agrawal | 43 | Oben Electric | INR 370 Cr | Electric Vehicles (EV) |
| 9 | Laina Emmanuel | 41 | Brainsight AI | INR 190 Cr | AI Software & Platforms |
| 9 | Rimjhim Agrawal | 41 | Brainsight AI | INR 190 Cr | AI Software & Platforms |
1. Vaishali Nigam Sinha: Bringing sustainability into ReNew’s growth strategy
Vaishali Nigam Sinha is the co-founder and chairperson of sustainability at ReNew, one of India’s largest renewable-energy companies. Established in 2011, ReNew has expanded beyond wind and solar power into storage, green hydrogen, carbon markets and other decarbonisation solutions.
Sinha oversees the company’s sustainability and environmental, social and governance agenda and also serves as the founding chair of the ReNew Foundation. Before entering the clean-energy industry, Sinha spent more than 15 years in investment banking across India, the US and the UK.
She holds a master’s degree in public policy from Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, where she was an American Association of University Women scholar. She has also completed Harvard Business School’s Owners/President Management programme.
2. Rajoshi Ghosh: From computational biology to enterprise software
Rajoshi Ghosh co-founded Hasura with Tanmai Gopal and served as its chief operating officer as the company built an open-source technology platform which allowed developers to connect applications with databases through GraphQL.
The company emerged as one of India’s prominent global enterprise-software startups and was valued at $1 billion following a funding round in 2022. Ghosh has since been associated with PromptQL, Hasura’s AI-focused product and business evolution, where she works across the technology’s commercial and ecosystem development.
Ghosh studied computational biology at the National University of Singapore and began her career as a bioinformatics researcher at the Genome Institute of Singapore.
She later completed Stanford Graduate School of Business’s Ignite programme. A serial entrepreneur, she has helped establish multiple ventures and has been recognised as a World Economic Forum Global Shaper.
3. Prukalpa Sankar: Building the data foundation for the AI economy
Prukalpa Sankar is the co-founder and co-chief executive of Atlan, a platform that helps organisations catalogue, govern and understand their data. As businesses deploy more artificial-intelligence tools, Atlan is positioning itself as a “context layer” that allows employees and AI systems to find reliable information about an organisation’s data, definitions and workflows.
The company has raised more than $200 million from investors including Insight Partners, Sequoia Capital India, Meritech Capital and Singapore’s GIC. Before Atlan, Sankar co-founded SocialCops, a data-intelligence company that worked with governments and international institutions.
Its projects included data platforms and development trackers for organisations such as the United Nations and the World Bank. That experience of managing fragmented public-sector data ultimately helped shape the technology that became Atlan.
4. Rashi Agarwal: Electrifying last-mile deliveries
Rashi Agarwal is the co-founder of Zypp Electric, an electric-vehicle-as-a-service platform focused on last-mile deliveries. The company supplies electric two-wheelers and three-wheelers, riders and fleet-management technology to businesses seeking to move their urban deliveries away from petrol-powered vehicles.
Agarwal has held business and operational leadership roles at the company, including responsibility for customer acquisition, partnerships and expansion.
A commerce graduate and gold medallist from SSJ College, Agarwal later pursued an MBA in finance and marketing. She worked at S&P Capital IQ for around seven years, including as a senior research associate, before entering entrepreneurship.
Her first venture was fashion platform LetsFlaunt, after which she co-founded what eventually became Zypp Electric with Akash Gupta.
5. Rithika Mohan: Scaling an Indian drone manufacturer
Rithika Mohan is the co-founder and chief administrative officer of Garuda Aerospace, a Chennai-headquartered drone manufacturer and services company.
Founded in 2015, Garuda initially concentrated on agricultural and industrial drone applications before broadening its portfolio to surveillance, logistics and defence-related unmanned systems. Mohan’s responsibilities have included administration, business strategy, marketing and the organisational systems required to scale the company.
Mohan holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Christ University in Bengaluru and has undertaken executive education at Harvard Business School.
Her managerial background complements the engineering and product-development side of the drone company, which has expanded through manufacturing, pilot training and drone-as-a-service operations.
6. Sulajja Firodia Motwani: Moving an automotive legacy towards EVs
Sulajja Firodia Motwani is the founder and chief executive of Kinetic Green Energy & Power Solutions and the vice-chairperson of Kinetic Engineering.
A third-generation member of the Firodia business family, she has led the group’s expansion into electric mobility, including electric two-wheelers, three-wheelers and small vehicles designed for last-mile transportation.
Motwani graduated in commerce from Brihan Maharashtra College of Commerce and obtained an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University.
Before joining the family business, she worked for investment-analytics company BARRA International in California. Her career has spanned Kinetic’s traditional automotive operations as well as its transition towards cleaner vehicle technologies.
7. Sarita Ahlawat: A scientist building indigenous drone technology
Dr Sarita Ahlawat is the co-founder and managing director of BotLab Dynamics, an IIT Delhi-incubated drone-technology company.
BotLab gained public visibility through large, synchronised drone-light shows and has subsequently expanded its focus towards indigenous drone systems, agricultural applications and technologies relevant to India’s defence ecosystem.
Ahlawat holds a PhD in microbiology from the University of Illinois at Chicago and brought a research-oriented approach to the company’s development. She has also been associated with Living Science Group, a science-communication initiative.
At BotLab, she works alongside a multidisciplinary team combining software, electronics, flight systems and swarm-coordination technology.
8. Madhumita Agrawal: Taking electric motorcycles to the mass market
Madhumita Agrawal is the founder and chief executive of Bengaluru-based Oben Electric, which develops electric motorcycles and related components. She oversees areas including sales, distribution, finance, marketing and the company’s wider expansion strategy.
Unlike several early electric two-wheeler startups that concentrated on scooters, Oben has sought to build its position around motorcycles.
Agrawal trained as a biotechnology engineer before studying law at IIT Kharagpur, with a focus on intellectual property. She has also pursued management education at IIM Bangalore.
Before establishing Oben, she co-founded IPexcel, a technology-research and consulting business serving multinational and Fortune 500 clients. Her background across engineering, patents and technology consulting helped shape her entry into EV manufacturing.
9. Laina Emmanuel: Taking AI-generated brain maps to clinicians
Co-founder and chief executive of BrainSightAI, Laina Emmanuel is an engineering graduate from the National Institute of Technology Calicut. A neurotechnology company, BrainSightAI combines artificial intelligence with brain imaging.
Emmanuel began her career in software engineering before working on public-health and international-development programmes.
The startup develops tools intended to help neurosurgeons, radiologists and psychiatrists understand neural connections and prepare more individualised treatment or surgical plans. Emmanuel leads the business, healthcare partnerships and commercial development sides of the company.
An engineering graduate from the National Institute of Technology Calicut, Emmanuel began her career in software engineering before working on public-health and international-development programmes.
She subsequently completed an MBA focused on marketing and healthcare from the Indian School of Business. Her combination of technology, public-health and business experience led her to explore how advanced medical tools could be made more useful to clinicians.
10. Rimjhim Agrawal: Applying machine learning to neuroscience
Dr Rimjhim Agrawal is the co-founder and chief technology officer of BrainSightAI. She leads the company’s scientific and technological work at the intersection of machine learning, psychiatry and brain imaging. BrainSightAI’s platform processes MRI and other clinical data to create visual representations of the brain’s structural and functional connections.
Agrawal earned her PhD from the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences, where her research examined how artificial intelligence could be applied to psychiatry and neurological conditions.
Her research background provided the scientific foundation for BrainSightAI, which she established with Emmanuel after the two met through an entrepreneurship programme.
What the ranking says about India’s new economy
Clean energy and electric mobility dominate the valuation table. ReNew, Zypp Electric, Kinetic Green and Oben Electric collectively account for Rs 27,230 crore, or nearly 58% of the combined company valuation represented by the 10 leaders.
The nature of the businesses is also significant. These are not predominantly advertising, commerce or consumer-app companies. Several operate in sectors requiring manufacturing capacity, scientific research, specialised software, regulatory approvals or long investment cycles.
Hasura and Atlan are building enterprise-data infrastructure. Garuda Aerospace and BotLab Dynamics are developing unmanned systems. BrainSightAI is trying to turn AI-led neuroscience into a clinical product. The remaining companies are participating directly in the energy and mobility transition.
The ranking, therefore, offers a wider definition of India’s new economy—one shaped not merely by businesses moving online, but by companies attempting to transform how the country produces energy, moves goods, manages data, deploys machines and delivers healthcare.
The valuations should not be read as the personal wealth of the women listed or as an estimate of their individual ownership. They are company valuations attributed by Hurun and provide a broad measure of the scale of the enterprises with which the leaders are associated.