India’s deep tech push gets $1 bn boost from Indian and US VCs, first bets already in play

India’s deep tech push gets $1 bn boost from Indian, US VCs, first bets already in play

Eight leading Indian and US venture capital and private equity firms have joined hands to back India’s deep tech ecosystem with a $1 billion commitment — a collaborative effort that was finalised in less than a month and has already started deploying capital.

Firms including Celesta Capital, Premji Invest, Accel, Blume Ventures, Gaja Capital, Venture Catalysts, Tenacity and IdeaSpring have signed on to the initiative.

Investors involved in the effort told Moneycontrol the government is expected to support it through a one-to-one matching of funds, effectively doubling the pool to at least $2 billion for startups building foundational technologies.

“We put this together in just a month. The willingness to commit was very high — we quickly brought eight firms on board, and we expect that number to grow,” said Sriram Viswanathan, founding managing partner of Celesta Capital.

Addressing a long-standing gap

The alliance comes at a time when policymakers and industry leaders have flagged India’s weak presence in deep tech.

In April this year, Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal drew criticism for publicly chastising startups and pointing out that India had only about 1,000 ventures in the sector. He termed it “a disturbing situation,” stressing that the country must innovate beyond consumer internet and services.

Funding has historically been a bottleneck for deep tech, which requires long development cycles and high capital intensity. The new initiative is being seen as a way to bridge that gap, especially with government backing in place.

Unlike a pooled fund, each investor will make independent bets while collaborating on technical diligence, operational support, and policy advocacy. “Most importantly, we’re going to use this platform to work with the government to make the right technology policy, tax policy and support for this ecosystem,” Viswanathan said, adding that the eight firms have a formal agreement to collaborate.

Separately, the Union Cabinet in March approved the Research, Development and Innovation (RDI) scheme with a corpus of Rs 1 lakh crore, aimed at encouraging the private sector to scale up R&D in strategic areas such as semiconductors, space, defense and biotech. The government has positioned this as a key plank for Atmanirbharta, or self-reliance, in critical technologies.

Industry groups, too, are mobilising. The Startup Policy Forum (SPF) recently set up a DeepTech Advisory Board with leading investors, founders, policymakers, and academics to strengthen the ecosystem and steer policy direction for the sector.

Strategic bets, first deals

The focus areas for the new initiative span semiconductors, artificial intelligence, robotics, defense, space technology, bioconvergence, cloud technologies, and medical devices — explicitly aligned with what the government has termed “strategic sunrise sectors.”

Celesta has already deployed capital under this initiative, backing OneCell Diagnostics, which uses AI to detect cancer tumour cells, and 5C Networks, which applies machine learning to radiology scans for more accurate cancer detection.

“This is not about consumer internet or e-commerce companies. It’s really about foundational technology,” Viswanathan said. “With at least $2 billion going into the ecosystem, we’re very excited about what this means for India’s future in deep tech.”

With the first wave of investments already underway, the $1 billion industry commitment — when paired with government support — could prove to be India’s most significant push yet to seed and scale deep tech startups.