India’s coffee boom is usually measured in the spread of cafes and the rise of specialty roasters. But another set of companies is quietly riding the same wave — startups that supply the machines behind the coffee counter.
With cafe culture expanding and home brewing gaining traction, startups selling coffee machines and related services are scaling rapidly. The domestic coffee machine market was valued at about $194 million in 2024, and industry executives say that the demand is being driven not just by cafe chains but also by offices, hospitality businesses and a growing base of home brewers.
These startups make money not only from selling or distributing machines, both their own and those sourced from global manufacturers, but also from services layered on top. Installation, training, maintenance and technical support are often bundled into subscription-style offerings, creating recurring revenue streams.
New Revenue Model
“Technology is changing the category,” Sharad Bansal, co-founder of Warmup Ventures, told FE. Modern machines are increasingly connected devices with app-based controls, personalised brewing settings and automated reorders for beans or filters. “What looks like a hardware sale becomes a recurring revenue model,” he said.
The approach has allowed startups to build what investors describe as a SaaS-like model rather than a traditional appliance business. Their customer base extends beyond specialty cafes to include roasters, bakeries, restaurants, offices, retailers and banks.
Companies such as Kaapi Machines, Three One Coffee Engineering and Brewing Gadgets have emerged as notable players in the segment.
For Bengaluru-based Kaapi Machines, consulting and helping new cafe businesses set up operations accounts for more than half its revenue. The company works with startup cafes as well as national and international chains, while also supplying equipment to coffee roasters and vending distributors serving offices and retail spaces.
Smaller cafes and hotel, restaurant, and catering (Horeca) clients are served through kitchen equipment dealer networks across cities. The company says it now caters to more than 2,500 cafes and a similar number of offices and other locations each year. Revenue crossed Rs 110 crore in FY25, reflecting a five-year compound annual growth rate of about 35%.
The company expects around 30% growth by FY27 as it expands into adjacent equipment categories and sells more of its own manufactured products.
The company has also pushed into direct-to-consumer sales. “Our customer base has been primarily coffee businesses. But, during COVID, we observed a strong demand from home brewers and built an e-commerce business, called Something’s Brewing, to address this need,” Abhinav Mathur, CEO and MD, Kaapi Machine said. The platform now operates three retail stores and sells equipment under brands such as Budan for home brewing and Bohne for coffee and chai machines.
Startups entering the segment have also benefited from changes in manufacturing and distribution, Bansal said. “Contract manufacturing lets founders design machines without building factories, while e-commerce and D2C platforms help them reach customers without traditional retail.”
For Sanjay Jogadia, founder and CEO of Three One Coffee Engineering, the opportunity became clear after years of working with cafes and hospitality brands.
Expansion Beyond Metros
“Many entrepreneurs were opening cafes, but few focused on the infrastructure behind the counter — equipment, training and service,” he said. The company, founded in 2019, has since grown at roughly 62% CAGR, scaling from about `80 lakh in its first partial year to Rs 15 crore in FY25. It expects revenue of about Rs 24 crore in the current financial year.
The firm supplies equipment from global manufacturers such as La Marzocco, Eversys and Fiorenzato to specialty coffee chains, independent cafes, restaurants and hospitality groups including Blue Tokai Coffee Roasters, Third Wave Coffee and French Loaf.
While its core focus remains businesses, Jogadia said a small but growing segment of home coffee enthusiasts is also seeking professional-grade machines.
Geography is the next frontier. Companies that began in metros are now targeting cities such as Lucknow, Indore, Coimbatore and Jaipur as coffee consumption spreads beyond traditional urban hubs.
“These markets want the same cafe-quality experience that metros saw earlier, but infrastructure hasn’t caught up everywhere yet,” Bansal said. That gap, he added, is where machine-led startups are finding strong demand.
Industry observers say the model also benefits from lower capital requirements compared with running cafes. Opening a cafe can require Rs 30-40 lakh before the first cup is sold, followed by ongoing costs such as rent, staff and utilities. Machine-led businesses avoid most of those expenses, focusing instead on product, distribution and support.
The model also scales differently. Cafe chains grow outlet by outlet, while equipment companies can deploy dozens of machines through a single enterprise deal with offices, hotels or co-working spaces. Each installation then generates recurring revenue through consumables and service contracts.