Sovereign AI In Focus, Snapdeal Parent Close To IPO & More

Sovereign AI In Focus 

Should India build its own foundational and large language models? That question got a clear and resounding yes in 2025. The era of “Sovereign AI” has officially arrived, and the race to build indigenous intelligence is moving at breakneck speed.

The Sovereign Shift: The jump from ambiguity to urgency was triggered largely by geopolitics and market reality. After China’s DeepSeek unveiled high-performance models at drastically low costs, the Indian government realised that relying on Silicon Valley was a strategic vulnerability. 

The IndiaAI Mission moved quickly from vague timelines to active execution, hunting for builders capable of creating sovereign models. The result is a cohort of 12 key players, including Sarvam AI, Gan.AI, BharatGen, and Soket AI, tasked with ensuring India owns its data and its intelligence.

Fuelling The Engine: The biggest hurdle, however, has been resources. While private venture capital in India favoured safer bets on AI applications, foundational model builders faced a capital drought. The government stepped in to fill this void, not just with funds, but with the new gold standard of tech: GPUs. By allocating scarce Nvidia H100 clusters to these startups, the state is effectively subsidising the heavy R&D costs. The bet is paying off, with early victories like BharatGen’s 3 Bn parameter model and Fractal’s open-source releases proving that India can ship code, not just talk about it.

A “UPI Moment” for AI? India isn’t trying to copy the US capital-heavy model or the Chinese state-controlled ecosystem. Instead, the strategy is evolving into a unique Public-Private Partnership—a “UPI model” for AI. 

The focus is shifting toward domain-specific Small Language Models (SLMs) in healthcare and STEM, which offer high utility at lower costs. By combining government compute with academic talent and private agility, India aims to become a creator in the deeptech ecosystem rather than just a consumer.

The infrastructure is being built and the models are training, but can a public-private partnership really outpace the trillion-dollar budgets of US tech giants? The answer might surprise you.

From The Editor’s Desk

📢 AceVector Files Updated DRHP

• Snapdeal’s parent entity has filed its updated DHRP with SEBI for an IPO, which will comprise a fresh issue of shares worth up to INR 300 Cr and an OFS component of up to 6.39 Cr shares.
• AceVector Group has three verticals – Snapdeal, Unicommerce, and Stellaro Brands. The three entities were consolidated in 2022 to create a diversified ecommerce ecosystem.
• AceVector’s revenue from operations grew nearly 35% YoY to INR 244.4 Cr in H1 FY26, with losses narrowing 80% YoY to INR 22.4 Cr, indicating improved financial health.

⚠️ OneCard Under RBI Scanner

• The RBI has directed OneCard’s partner banks to stop issuing co-branded credit cards in partnership with the fintech startup. The RBI has sought more clarity on data-sharing practices between OneCard and its banking partners.
• In the past year, the central bank clamped down on such products and instructed several banks, like Federal Bank and South Indian Bank, to halt or rework co-branded credit card partnerships.
• Founded in 2019, OneCard partners with multiple banks to issue co-branded credit cards while managing customer acquisition and management. The startup’s operating revenue surged 163% YoY to INR 1,425.58 Cr in FY24, while losses remained flat at INR 401.15 Cr.

📉 New-Age Tech Stocks Bleed Last Week 

• It was a turbulent first week of December for startup stocks, with 35 out of 47 companies under Inc42’s coverage seeing their stock prices fall between 0.22% and 30%. This led to a $3 Bn erosion in their market capitalisation.
• ​The selling pressure was particularly severe for DroneAcharya, which plunged 29.13% after SEBI’s crackdown, and Ola Electric, which hit new all-time lows amid ongoing operational and market share struggles.​
• Only a handful of companies, including newly-listed Capillary Technologies and PhysicsWallah, managed to post gains, highlighting the divergent fortunes of new-age tech stocks amid broader market turbulence.​

📊 AppsForBharat’s Losses Widen In FY25

• The spiritual tech startup’s net loss widened 16% YoY to INR 45.3 Cr in FY25 as mounting expenses outpaced its top-line surge. Operating revenues zoomed 3.8X YoY to INR 69.6 Cr, while expenses doubled YoY to INR 117.9 Cr.
• AppsForBharat’s flagship app, Sri Mandir, claims to have seen 1.2 Mn users complete 5.2 Mn rituals across 70+ partnered temples in the last 12 months. It also claims to have served over 3 Lakh devotees during the Mahakumbh Mela 2025.
• This comes as the homegrown spiritual tech market continues to expand rapidly, driven by rising smartphone penetration, strong Gen Z demand and digitisation of rituals. Overall, this space is projected to hit over $135 Bn by 2034.

✂️ Startup Layoffs Surge in 2025

• Forty-four new-age tech companies laid off over 9,500 employees in 2025, surpassing 2024’s 9,000 job cuts but still down from 2023’s post-pandemic peak of 17,000. 
• Ola Electric led the charts as it fired 1,000+ employees during the year, followed by defunct BluSmart with 800. Eternal, Ecom Express and HeadWorks took the third spot as they laid off 500 employees each.
• Largely to blame for these retrenchments were factors like shutdowns, AI-driven automation, startups prioritising operational efficiency over headcount growth and the ban on online real money gaming.

Inc42 Markets

Inc42 Startup Spotlight

How CrisprBits Is Giving Diagnostics A Makeover

India’s healthcare system has long struggled with slow, expensive, and infrastructure-heavy diagnostic tools. The need for rapid, affordable, and accessible diagnostics remains ever-present. Enter CrisprBits, a startup trying to solve this problem. 

The CRISPR Revolution: Founded in 2020, CrisprBits’s flagship product, PathCrisp, leverages CRISPR technology to deliver rapid, highly accurate tests for diseases like sickle cell, typhoid, and antimicrobial resistance. Unlike traditional PCR tests, PathCrisp is portable, works at room temperature, and costs just INR 500-800 per test, making it accessible even in rural and resource-limited settings.​

Building For The Future: CrisprBits isn’t stopping at diagnostics. The startup is also building EdiCrisp for gene editing in industrial processes (such as biofuel production), and CurieCrisp for future therapeutic solutions to genetic disorders. Buoyed by its recent $3 Mn funding, the startup now plans to expand globally.

The Road Ahead: With a strong pipeline of products and a vision to democratise synthetic biology, CrisprBits, going forward, plans to accelerate the commercialisation of its products and build IPs. The startup is eyeing a pie of the global CRISPR market, which is projected to reach $27.3 Bn by 2030.​

But a key question remains: can CrisprBits’ innovative product stack unlock a new era of affordable diagnostics for India?

Infographic Of The Day

In 2025, many founders moved on to the next chapter of their lives – some driven by intense burnout and others due to strategic shifts at their startups. Here are the key founder exits of the year…