The startup ecosystem in the country is past the phase of slowdown and is likely to witness high growth over the next 2-3 years, founders and investors told FE at the Startup Mahakumbh 2025, which started in the Capital on Thursday.
As investors grew cautious after 2021 and 2022, the funding to startups fell in 2023. This brought down valuations for several big players and forced other to clean their books.
“Investors are now showing more confidence in putting money,” a founder of a D2C brand told FE.
“The deal sizes are smaller and profitability is evaluated but definitely they are coming back,” an investor said.
According to a survey released by IT industry body Nasscom with Zinnov at the event, 75% of the founders are increasingly optimistic about their fundraising prospects for 2025. It is significantly higher than 46% in 2023.
Moreover, 99% of the founders surveyed said that their revenues will grow in 2025.
While there is more comfort towards investments as compared to earlier, some specific sectors are witnessing higher interest as compared to other. These include deep tech and cleantech, especially those integrating Artificial Intelligence.
Sanjay Nayar, founder, Sorin Investments, and president of Assocham highlighted that there is a need for more capital towards these sectors.
“We must make sure that we strategically channel this capital not just towards growth, but towards building fundamentally deep tech sustainable solutions,” he said.
At the Mahakumbh, startups like Baaz and Moonrider showcased innovative ways of adopting electric mobility into newer areas.
For instance, Moonrider is launching electric tractors priced at par with diesel tractors for the farming sector. Its CBO Shashank Ananth said that they would also enter the charging infrastructure space with their charging hubs.
Rajesh Nambiar, president of IT industry body Nasscom said that India needs to transition from being a user of technology to a creator and builder of transformative technologies.
He added that achieving the goal of reaching $7 trillion by 2030 would require the tech sector to lead in innovation, particularly through deep tech.
There is also increased adoption of AI among startups across the sectors. For instance, CarDekho showcased its platform ai.cardekho.com which integrates AI into customer queries.
Gaming companies Games 24*7 and Dream11 highlighted the need for adoption of AI by companies as well as people in a changing world.
“We are using AI in all the places you can imagine,” Games 24*7 co-CEO Bhavin Pandya said.