India has cleared a $1.1 billion state-backed enterprise capital program that can channel authorities cash into startups by means of non-public traders, doubling down on its effort to finance high-risk areas resembling synthetic intelligence, superior manufacturing and different sectors broadly referred to by the business as deep tech.
First outlined within the January 2025 funds speech by India’s finance minister, the ₹100 billion fund received cupboard approval this week (greater than a yr after the speech), permitting the federal government to maneuver forward with deployment. A earlier iteration of this system, launched in 2016, dedicated ₹100 billion to 145 non-public funds which have invested greater than ₹255 billion (about $2.8 billion) in over 1,370 startups, in line with official knowledge released on Saturday.
This system is structured as a fund of funds, a standard enterprise capital mannequin by which governments again startups not directly by committing capital to non-public funding corporations. It’s designed to take a extra focused method than its 2016 counterpart, specializing in deep-tech and manufacturing startups that sometimes require longer time horizons and bigger quantities of capital, whereas additionally backing early-stage founders, increasing funding past main cities and strengthening India’s home enterprise capital business, significantly smaller funds, per the Indian authorities.
On the announcement on Saturday, IT minister Ashwini Vaishnaw highlighted the dimensions of India’s startup growth, pointing to figures proven on a presentation slide indicating the variety of startups has grown from fewer than 500 in 2016 to greater than 200,000 right now. The slide mentioned greater than 49,000 startups have been registered in 2025 alone, the very best annual whole on report.
The cupboard approval follows current adjustments to India’s startup guidelines geared toward easing strain on deep-tech firms. New Delhi doubled the interval for which such corporations are categorised as startups to twenty years and raised the income threshold for startup-specific tax, grant and regulatory advantages to ₹3 billion, or about $33 million, up from ₹1 billion beforehand.
The approval comes simply forward of the government-backed India AI Affect Summit, the place international AI firms together with OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Meta, Microsoft, and Nvidia are set to take part alongside Indian corporates resembling Reliance Industries and Tata Group. India, the world’s most populous nation and one among its largest web markets with greater than a billion on-line customers, has develop into an more and more engaging area for international tech firms seeking to increase their consumer base.
On the similar time, non-public capital has develop into more durable to safe. India’s startup ecosystem raised $10.5 billion in 2025, down simply over 17% from a yr earlier, whilst traders grew extra selective and sharply lowered the variety of offers. The variety of funding rounds fell almost 39% to 1,518 transactions, in line with knowledge from Tracxn.
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June 23, 2026
Vaishnaw mentioned the brand new enterprise capital program would stay versatile, including that “intensive consultations have taken place with all stakeholders.”
