Deep-tech now forms over half of VC portfolios in India as firms like Cornerstone, Unicorn India Ventures and All in Capital back startups combining research with scalable models
The US has replaced random H-1B selection with a wage-weighted lottery and a new $100,000 fee for applications, raising uncertainty for students and junior hires.
Though the oldest Alphas are just turning 15 in 2025, they're already more digitally fluent than any generation before, points out Sandeep Goyal.
India may be 15th among the top 25 Artificial Intelligence nations, but it has the 'the greatest upward potential' according to research by Tufts University's business school, the Fletcher School. At the top is the US, followed by China, fighting for global leadership in AI followed by the UK, Japan, and Germany. In the 15th spot, India is ahead of Brazil, Argentina, Indonesia, Mexico, Turkey, Indonesia and Thailand.
An initiative of Nandan Nilekani's EkStep Foundation, people+ai on Tuesday unveiled its vision for the future of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in India, dubbed 'Adbhut India' (Amazing India). It aims to harness AI as a powerful tool to enhance the lives of all Indians. The event marked the rollout of several initiatives by people+ai that are focused on discovering, demonstrating, and disseminating population-scale AI use cases for India.
Creating an LLM trained on Indian languages is not easy. Experts say each language in India has a nuance of its own, so creating a ChatGPT-like product is an ambitious challenge.
'Employers increasingly want candidates who can take AI pilots from proof-of-concept to production-ready systems.' 'That requires governance, monitoring, and ROI measurement -- skills that go beyond coding and into business impact.'
'The next decade will be even more transformative,' says Prime Minister Modi. 'We are moving from digital governance to global digital leadership.'
For Dinesh Nirmal (pictured), who heads IBM Software, one of his mandates is to integrate generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) into all products IBM builds and leverage it to enhance developer productivity across global labs. Nirmal believes that one of the biggest benefits of GenAI is automation, leading to optimisations and productivity gains. He shares that IBM Software has observed productivity gains of 30-40 per cent in some segments of software development.
The government is proposing to use Artificial Intelligence and other innovative methods to check traffic violations and ensure that penalties are levied accurately, Union minister Nitin Gadkari said on Thursday. Addressing the 12th edition of the Traffic InfraTech Expo, the minister outlined plans for upgrading toll collection methods, including the exploration of satellite toll systems, which would improve efficiency and ensure transparency in toll collection. Gadkari noted that road safety cannot be achieved without integrating advanced engineering solutions, enforcement of laws, and the adoption of cutting-edge technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI).
'What we are seeing today is India stepping into its digital confidence, not as a follower but a leader.'
'In the long run, India's strong growth story and reforms to make assets globally attractive will determine the rupee's resilience.'
The TIME 100 AI list is an interesting assortment of titans. Indians make up about 20 per cent of the coveted list, which is pretty commendable, notes Sandeep Goyal.
Generative artificial intelligence (AI), climate tech and fintech sectors will be the hot areas for venture capitalists and founders in the next year, according to the prediction by Prashanth Prakash, founding partner of the global venture capital firm Accel Partners in India and the chairperson of Karnataka Startup Vision Group. Prakash said that about $25 billion has been invested into building Gen AI globally. But a lot of that capital has not yet come to India, opening up huge opportunities for startups in the country.
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar has called on Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa (BRICS) to defend the multilateral trading system amid increasing protectionism and tariff volatility during a meeting of the bloc's foreign ministers in New York on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly session.
Fresher hiring grew by 8 per cent driven by non-IT services oil and gas, real estate, and education sectors.
'Binary fission will happen -- startups will lead to more startups.'
India is expected to overtake the US as the largest developer community on GitHub by 2027, Microsoft chairman and chief executive officer Satya Nadella said during his address to 1,100 developers and technology leaders at the Microsoft AI Tour in Bengaluru on Thursday. India is the fastest-growing market on GitHub, a Microsoft-owned software development platform, with 13.2 million developers using it.
Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal's scathing remarks on Indian startup ecosystem and its innovation priorities have drawn sharp reaction from the industry, with Zepto CEO Aadit Palicha putting up a strong defence citing the company's contribution to jobs, FDI and terming it a "miracle in Indian innovation".
Startups that became unicorns in 2024 took an average of nine years and six months to reach $1 billion valuation, reflecting the impact of a prolonged funding squeeze from PE/VC firms over the past few years.
Bessemer Venture Partners has closed $350 million in capital for its second dedicated India fund to back founders in the region, who build enduring companies.
'The heat shield technology for re-entry vehicles was first mastered in DRDO for the Agni missile.' 'This is why the Americans were so opposed to Agni in the 1980s, unlike other missiles -- it was a re-entry vehicle.'
Global tech major Adobe Systems' chief executive Shantanu Narayen on Thursday said creativity, and not software code, will be the main driver of India's economy in the future.
'This Lok Sabha election is more of a trial for GenAI content.'
The autonomous satellite swarm is being designed for the Defence Space Agency.
'You can imagine for India what Shuks means not just to the billions of people in India but the entire Indian diaspora around the world.'
'You think: Did I fail the people I had to let go? Did I promise something I couldn't deliver? That day (when we had to sack 70 people) will stay with me.'
'We do not need short-term measures but long-term ones. Companies seem to have given up on the infrastructure part. Long delays are fuelling more traffic crisis.'
Among the 44 per cent of Indian students who have used Gen AI in their studies, 60 per cent say it helps them learn faster, 55 per cent say it allows them more creative use of learning, while 51 per cent say it frees up their time.
A software engineer who was suddenly laid off after 15 years shares the lessons he learnt about how to cope in these uncertain, insecure times.
Google is building voice and text search for over 100 Indian languages and will spend $75 million to support women-led startups in the country, said its CEO Sundar Pichai at the start of his visit to India - a nation that he saw as a big export economy. India, he said, will be a big export economy and it needs to create a balance between safeguarding citizens and enabling companies to innovate with its framework. Pichai first met Telecom and IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw and spoke at a Google for India 2022 event before calling on Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
E-commerce startup Dukaan has replaced 90 per cent of its customer support team with an artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot, founder and CEO Suumit Shah informed on Tuesday. Attributing the decision to prioritising profitability, he said customer support costs reduced by 85 per cent while resolution time went down from over two hours to three minutes. "We had to lay off 90 per cent of our support team because of this AI chatbot. Tough? Yes. Necessary? Absolutely," Shah tweeted.
India's Venture Capital (VC) ecosystem exhibited robust growth in 2024, with funding surging 43 per cent year-on-year to $13.7 billion, according to a report. This recovery was fuelled by a 45 per cent rise in deal activity, with 1,270 transactions recorded, reinforcing India's position as the second largest market for venture capital and growth funding in the Asia-Pacific region, the report by Bain & Company and IVCA said.
If completed, this deal would place OpenAI among the most valuable private companies globally, alongside Musk's SpaceX and ByteDance, the parent company of TikTok, according to The New York Times.
Two sectors, fintech and media & entertainment, attracted 45 per cent of total funding by value, led by large ticket deals such as CRED and Dailyhunt.
Altman said he was "looking forward" to returning to his previous role at the AI firm.
US technology company NVIDIA and billionaire Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Industries on Friday announced a partnership to build AI supercomputers in India. "The companies will work together to build AI infrastructure that is over an order of magnitude more powerful than the fastest supercomputer in India today," the firms said in a statement. Days before the announcement, NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang met Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday.
'The scrapping of import duty would help Indian companies compete in international markets, thus paving the way for India becoming a space manufacturing hub for the world.'
'To tell you the truth, we did not expect Iris to make such waves, to get so much attention.'
Harry Kane believes artificial intelligence (AI) could be the future of injury prevention in soccer
