Niti Aayog’s Amitabh Kant Believes These AI-Based Startups Are Solving India’s Problems

On how startups leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) are bringing a substantial change in everyday lives of citizens, Amitabh Kant, CEO of Niti Aayog, took to Twitter to point out that India is witnessing AI startups focused on solving the problems of accessibility, affordability, and availability.

On Friday, Kant also listed the sectors — healthcare, agriculture, education, natural language processing, retail, and transport — in which startups incorporating AI are changing the overall landscape in India.

Kant also named startups in these sectors, which are helping in the transformation of the country. Here’s is the list –

• Healthcare Startups

SigTuple:

Founded in 2015 by Tathagato Rai Dastidar, Rohit Kumar Pandey, and Apurv Anand, SigTuple develops medical solutions for high-volume screening tests that require manual analysis of visual medical data. The Bengaluru-based startup also works in the development of a cloud-based lab operating system to run the operations of a diagnostic lab.

SigTuple, in April 2019, has raised $16 Mn in its Series C funding round led by Trusted Insights, with participation from Accel Partners, Chiratae Ventures, Pi Ventures, Binny Bansal, and Trifecta Capital.

Tricog:

Another Bangalore-based healthcare analytics startup, Tricog, was founded in January 2015 by Dr Charit Bhograj along with Dr Zainul Charbiwala, Abhinav Gujjar, and Dr Udayan Dasgupta.

Tricog aims to help preserve people’s lives through technology. Its solution includes installing a cloud-connected ECG machine in primary and secondary care medical centres – clinics, polyclinics, nursing homes, and hospitals. The collected information is then sent to a centrally located hub for further analysis and the report is received through an SMS or a mobile app notification.

Forus:

Founded in 2010, Forus Health is a healthtech startup that aims to eradicate avoidable blindness. Over the years it has designed and developed affordable technology solutions to increase access and affordability of eye care. This Bengaluru-based startup was founded by K.Chandrasekhar and Shyam Vasudev.

• Agriculture:

SatSure:

Bengaluru-based agritech startup SatSure’s solutions helps commoditise space data to address the macro challenges in the agriculture sector with a high impact on enabling financial inclusion of farmers and food security for the nation.

The startup was recently among the list of 24 winners at the Mega Five Days Maharashtra Startup Week organised by the Maharashtra State Innovation Society (MSInS).

Vassar Labs:

Based in Vishakhapatnam with headquarters in Boston, Vassar Labs is a machine learning and AI-based solution provider that enables customers to bring new business models and differentiated services based on the internet of things (IoT), ML, AI and big data. Using sensors, satellite and crowdsourced data, they provide decision-making support in sectors like water, agriculture, education, etc.

In August 2018, Vassar Labs made it to the first batch of its inaugural class of the Google Launchpad Accelerator India.

• Education

Embibe:

Mumbai based ed-tech startup, Embibe, is an education analytics consumer tech startup that leverages a cross-roads of personalised data analytics and technology to capture exact student weaknesses centred around critical exam performance metrics like speed, accuracy, time management, attempt planning, stamina and also addresses psychological factors like confidence.

Backed by Kalaari Capital & Lightbox, Embibe was founded in November 2012 by Aditi Avasthi. Earlier, Embibe had acquired 100Marks, student guidance platforms for JEE Main, Advanced and Medical, in a cash plus stock deal.

• Natural Language Processing

Haptik:

Founded in 2013 by Aakrit Vaish and Swapan Rajdev, Haptik lets users chat with their voice assistants to complete daily tasks such as online shopping, travel bookings, food delivery among others.

In April 2019, the Mumbai-based startup was acquired by Mukesh Ambani-backed Reliance Jio in a whopping INR 700 Cr ($102.3 Mn) deal. With the transaction, Reliance Jio was planning to leverage Haptik’s capabilities across various devices and touchpoints in the consumer’s journey.

Niki:

Bengaluru-based commerce platform Niki (earlier Niki.ai) is a B2C commerce app used across Tier 2, 3 and 4 towns of India, to transact online by assisting them in every step with assurance through a conversational agent in ones’ language.

Founded in 2015 by Shishir Modi, Sachin Jaiswal, Keshav Prawasi, and Nitin Babel, Niki has recently raised an undisclosed amount of fresh funding from US-based fintech-specialist fund EMVC along with other investors.

• Retail

Mad Street Den

Founded in 2013 by Ashwini Asokan and her husband Anand Chandrasekaran, the startup’s ecommerce platform Vue.AI uses image recognition and data science to extract retail catalogue data, analyse it with user behaviour and help retailers make better, faster decisions.

The San Franciso based, in April 2017, has raised $17 Mn in a Series B funding round for its retail automation product Vue.ai.

• Transport

Netradyne:

Bengaluru and San Diego-based Netradyne is an artificial intelligence-based startup that focuses on the driver and commercial fleet safety. Last year, the startup has raised $21 Mn in a Series B round of funding by Microsoft’s corporate venture arm M12 (formerly Microsoft Ventures) and saw participation from Point72 Venture and existing investor Reliance Industries.

With the application of AI and deep learning, the startup provides real-time, crowdsourced, high definition (HD) maps using its commercially deployed Driveri™ devices. Netradyne also gives real-time insight into numerous aspects of driving, including road conditions, driver behaviours, unique driving scenarios, seasonal and weather-specific considerations, traffic patterns and concentrated geographic risk areas.

Locus:

Bengaluru-based Locus is a machine learning startup focused on simplifying logistics. It uses deep learning and proprietary algorithms to provide intelligent route optimisation, real-time tracking, insights, analytics, etc.

In May 2019, Locus had secured $22 Mn in a funding round led by New York-based hedge fund Falcon Edge, VC firm Tiger Global and its existing investors.

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