Mumbai  — With the focus of the central government and the support of technology business incubators such as the Society for Innovation & Entrepreneurship (SINE) at IIT Bombay, India; which 10 years ago didn’t have a deep tech ecosystem is now ranked amongst the top 10 such ecosystems globally.

“We are today ranked as Number 6 in deep tech ecosystems globally with even non deep tech venture capital (VC) funds, now allocating around 10%-20% of their corpus towards such ventures,” said Jatin Desai, General Partner, Inflexor Ventures speaking at the SINE organised summit, titled “Innovation Nation: Leveraging India’s Talent and Entrepreneurial Spirit in the Era of Disruptive Technologies. Multiple VCs who invest in this space said there are a now a fair amount of space tech, nanomaterials, agriculture and composites, food tech, biotech, aerospace and defence ventures at various stages of incubation. “Most of this deep tech deal sourcing is today coming from incubators such as SINE and each funds proprietary networks,” added Desai.

A little over a decade ago many deep tech enterprises in areas such as space couldn’t get funded even if the VCs liked the idea because they couldn’t see visibility on follow on funders. “But today it’s become easy for a deep tech venture to raise money as there are multiple funds who will look at Series A, B, C and D funding rounds,” said Samir Kapur General Partner, Athera Venture Partners speaking at the event organised to commemorate SINE’s 20th anniversary.

Part of the reason for the bullishness in the outlook of VC’s is both the growth opportunities presented by the sector – with the government for the first time coming out with a 10-year policy on space backed by budgets and also by the evolving maturity of the investee firms business models. “We believe that demand for aerospace and defence can cross the predicted 8% per annum growth mark to 20%-25% a year by looking at domestic and export markets,” said Maneck Behramdin, Business Head aerospace at Godrej & Boyce Manufacturing Company. Basant Gupta, CEO, Zeus Numerix spoke about how defence companies are now going deeper into their area of expertise rather than trying to be generalists. “We make dual use technology products for civilian and military applications so as to deal with the issue of customer concentration,” said Rahul Singh, CEO, ideaForge.

Seconding the companies Amey Belorkar, Senior Vice President, IDBI Capital Markets & Services said that thanks to the Israel and Ukraine wars, India’s status as a neutral country is making it every attractive for global firms, to Make in India and sell to the world.

In areas such as Medtech, firms such as ImmunoACT which has pioneered gene cell therapy in India have helped clear a regulatory pathway for cell and gene therapy. With over 300 paying patients treated so far have shown that the market for premium immunological treatments in India exists. “We realised that the only way we can make this kind of treatment affordable in India is to have our own intellectual property and create the entire value chain locally if our aim is to reduce costs by 90%,” said Professor Rahul Purwar, CEO, ImmunoACT.

Firms are applying deep tech in areas even as fundamental as water where India has the physical capacity to treat only 30% of the 72 billion litres of wastewater generated. “We have managed the entire sewage and water infrastructure of Istanbul for several years and now are managing the sewage for four Indian cities including Agra and Ghaziabad,” said Skandaprasad Seetharaman, Group CFO, VA Tech Wabag. Cities such as Chennai are already getting 50% of their water through desalination which by using green energy and new technology is making it cheaper than bottled water and even making recycled water perfectly potable. “Demand for water will only increase as new sectors such as green hydrogen and solar photovoltaic modules manufacturing will need ultra-pure water as an input to manufacturing rather than as a utility,” added Skandaprasad.

In deep tech sectors such as mobility, panelists remarked about how China’s two-wheeler market has gone entirely electric. “By 2030, I expect in India too, 80%-90% of the 2 wheelers sold will be electric. Even in cars, battery as a service concept is making the capital costs of electric cars almost 30%-40% cheaper than that of a conventional fuel based one,” said Gajanan Gandhe, Country Head, Dana India.

Addressing the innovation nation event Bhavish Aggarwal, Co-founder, Ola group said, “Momentum has built in starting up in India. Viksit Bharat will have to be founded on technological innovation by building jobs of the future for our citizens.”

Keeping this spirit in mind and to give further impetus to deep tech start-ups SINE has selected the first two recipients of a grant of Rs 50 lakh each, under its Project Titanium initiative. The grant funded by alumni of IIT Bombay, follows a competitive selection process for choosing companies that show the most promise in taking technology discovered at the premier engineering school’s labs and commercialise it, as a for profit venture. The first ever Project Titanium awardees include Rheoheme, which is developing low cost and low maintenance diagnostic platform for sickle cell disease, malaria and complete blood count for lower- and middle-income countries. The other awardee is Ferry Lifesciences which is developing a novel microfluidics device coupled with internet of things capabilities that can diagnose and treat anaemia – the commonest nutritional deficiency globally and a condition that affects every 1 of 2 Indian women.

In addition, IIT Bombay also announced that under its Institution of Eminence scheme it received 160 applications from aspiring start-ups.  In 2024, IIT Bombay has selected 4 firms each of which will receive investments of Rs 1 core each and incubation support by SINE. These firms founding teams have some previous association with IIT Bombay either as an employee, a student past or present or faculty member. The start-ups selected for this funding include:

1)           Exponentialists that seeks to revolutionize construction with artificial intelligence powered modelling, to enhance accuracy, efficiency, and lifecycle management.

2)           Deccan Crest Engineering which is developing a solution to recycle sand used in foundries using chemical and thermal reclamation to reduce environmental impact

3)           MatterWave Technologies that is developing semiconductors using Gallium nitride technology &

4)           iMumbai Semiconductors which is building a next generation global navigation radio frequency receiver chip across multiple platforms

SINE, celebrating 20 years of excellence, remains committed to nurturing start-ups that address national priorities, amplify India’s entrepreneurial spirit, and drive global impact. “I am quite excited about the types of companies that SINE attracts,” said Ankit Mehta, CEO, Ideaforge – probably India’s most famous drone manufacturer.

SINE has over the past 20 years supported 245 start-ups with a survival rate of over 80%—a remarkable feat considering the low survivability rate (20%) among startups in the early-stages of growth. SINE’s future focus areas underscore IIT Bombay’s commitment to supporting large number of transformative, high-impact technology innovations that can drive India’s progress and self-reliance and contribute to India as an ‘Innovation Nation’.