From The First AI Unicorn To The Death Of Angel Tax: The Biggest Highlights For Indian Startups In 2024

The Indian startup ecosystem truly came of age in 2024. Trends around profitability and strong fundamentals dominated the narrative for new-age tech companies in the year gone by, and became the highlights of 2024 for Indian startups.

Not just this, the year gone by saw the emergence of new India-specific models like quick commerce and homegrown startups fervently embracing the generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) and semiconductor mania. 

Investors too realised this and cautiously loosened their purse strings. As a result, Indian startups bagged more than $12 Bn, venture capital (VC) firms raised $8.7 Bn+ worth of funds and six startups entered the unicorn club in 2024.

What Stood Out In 2024: Indian Startup Highlights

And the future looks even more promising. Inc42 estimates that the number of smartphone and internet users will surge beyond the 120 Cr mark by 2030. This will likely pave the way for a more vibrant digital economy, which, in turn, is expected to spawn new use cases that will create a new subset of new-age tech companies catering to a new gamut of India’s burgeoning online users.

A major highlight in 2024 was the public listing of 13 startups and the continuation of the IPO wave that began in 2021. These high-profile public listings for new-age tech companies brought lucrative returns for early backers of some of the biggest names in the startup ecosystem. 

However, funding winter continued to loom heavily over the startup ecosystem in 2024 too, the year of extended capital drought. Amid green shots of revival, macroeconomic headwinds, growing instances of corporate misgovernance and subdued investor faith continued to mar the homegrown startup landscape.

Notwithstanding this, Indian new-age tech companies continued to push the envelope in 2024 and had their share of glory when it came to innovation and experimenting with new frontiers. With that sentiment in mind, let’s take you on a journey through the key achievements of the Indian startup ecosystem in 2024.

Indian Startup Funding Breached The $150 Bn Funding Mark In 2024

Even as the Indian startup ecosystem reeled under the impact of extended capital drought, the year 2024 had some silver lining as cumulative funding raised by homegrown new-age tech companies between 2014 and 2024 crossed the staggering $151 Bn mark. 

The biggest contributor to the tally was the FOMO-fueled 2021 when investors poured in $42 Bn in the Indian startups in a single year. 

However, the momentum slowed down soon after as the funding winter gripped the Indian startup ecosystem. As a result, funding declined to $25 Bn in 2022 and thereafter further to $10 Bn in 2023, which was significantly lower than pre-pandemic levels.

Notably, 2024 witnessed signs of improvement as Indian new-age tech companies bagged a total of $12 Bn during the year as funding pangs waned and investors began deploying dry powder across the board. 

Welcoming The First AI Unicorn: Ola Krutrim

Having minted just two unicorns throughout 2023, Indian startup ecosystem sprang a surprise as Bhavish Aggarwal-led Krutrim entered the coveted billion dollar valuation club in the first month of 2024 itself. 

Even though the homegrown tech landscape boasts of 118 unicorns currently, what was special about Krutrim was that it is India’s first artificial intelligence (AI) unicorn. As term sheets flew in overnight, Krutrim graced the headlines, giving a major impetus to India’s budding GenAI ecosystem. 

A brainchild of Aggarwal, Krutrim became the third unicorn from Ola’s stable. Since then, the GenAI platform has taken on the might of big tech major Google as well as listed MapmyIndia as it looks to create a niche in the burgeoning AI-driven geotech market. It has also made no qualms about its ambitions to build a desi large language model (LLM) and to foray into the chip manufacturing space. 

Zomato Becomes First Indian New-Age Tech Company In The BSE Sensex 30

India’s startup ecosystem cheered on as foodtech major Zomato became the first homegrown new-age tech company to enter the Sensex 30 index. The listed startup replaced JSW Steel, a 142-year-old steel giant, to grab a spot on the index that represents over 80% of BSE’s total market value. 

What pushed Zomato into Sensex 30 was the multibagger stock’s dream run on the bourses in the past one year. Having grown its profits multifold over the past six quarters, investors and brokerages alike have been bullish on the stock, which resulted in Zomato’s massive bull run. 

In the past one year, shares of the foodtech major have soared more than doubled, driven primarily by its growth engine quick commerce vertical Blinkit, slew of new offerings like going-out app District and broad based growth across segments. 

Angel Tax Gets A Long-Awaited Eulogy

After mounting an exhaustive campaign for the past 12 years, the Indian startup ecosystem broke in applause in 2024 as the government abolished the dreaded Angel Tax. 

Introduced in 2012 as one of the measures “to prevent the generation and circulation of unaccounted funds”, the new-age tech ecosystem from the very outset was up in arms against the provision, which was allegedly used to “harass” startups who raised capital from investors. 

While many notices under the law resulted in startups shutting down, many other entrepreneurs also left the country to domicile their ventures overseas to escape the “draconian law”.

Unsurprisingly, the abolition of the Angel Tax was met with unequivocal praise and glee as industry stakeholders like 3one4 Capital’s founding partner and chief financial officer (CFO) Siddarth Pai welcomed the post-Angel Tax era. 

However, questions remain over the pending cases, which are still a thorn in the feet of the growing Indian startup ecosystem. 

Ola Electric Becomes First EV Company On The Bourses

Jumping on the startup IPO wave that gripped the country in 2024, electric vehicle (EV) maker Ola Electric became the first Indian new-age EV startup to go public. The move to list on the bourses was hailed as a landmark moment signalling India’s readiness to embrace the rapid shift to electric mobility. 

Ola Electric’s listing, despite catching the attention of stock market investors and analysts, made a muted debut on the stock exchanges but soon caught up as the stock has been witnessing a healthy uptick on the exchanges. 

That said, the year was also marked by missteps including customer complaints, fire incidents, a government probe into the company’s poor after-sales service and founder and CEO Bhavish Aggarwal’s public spat with comedian Kunal Kamra over issues with its EVs. 

Making matters worse was the company continuously losing its market share to legacy giants like TVS Motor and Bajaj Auto even as it continued to announce forays into new segments in 2024, including electric motorcycles, electric three-wheelers, and low-speed electric scooters. 

Agnikul Launches World’s 1st Rocket With Fully 3D-Printed Engine

Emblematic of the Indian spacetech ecosystem’s reputation as a bastion of innovation, Agnikul added many feathers to its cap in 2024. The startup made history by launching indigenously designed and built Agnibaan SOrTeD (suborbital technological demonstrator), boasting the world’s first single-piece 3D-printed engine, on May 30. 

It also became the first launch from a private launchpad (Dhanus) of the country’s second privately built rocket. The launch of Agnibaan was also historic because it flew on a semi-cryogenic engine, in which a mix of liquid and gas is used as a propellant.

The Agnibaan rocket is a customisable, two-stage launch vehicle that can carry up to 300 kg of payload to orbits, nearly 700 kilometers in altitude. Going forward, the startup is looking at flying an orbital mission in 2025. 

Founded in 2017 by Srinath Ravichandran, Moin SPM, and S R Chakravarthy, Agnikul was also the first Indian startup to sign an agreement with Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) in 2020, which granted the spacetech company access to ISRO’s expertise and cutting-edge facilities. 

Pixxel Becomes First Indian Spacetech Startup To Grab Order From NASA

Pixxel was in the news for all the right reasons in 2024. The biggest feat in the spacetech startup’s kitty was that it secured a new contract from NASA to provide the space agency and the US government with hyperspectral Earth observation data.

Awarded the contract under NASA’s $476 Mn commercial smallsat data acquisition programme, the deal will be valid till November 2028. Under the collaboration, NASA will get real-time insights on climate change, agriculture, biodiversity, resource management, and more.

In 2024, the spacetech startup also inked a deal with the Ministry of Defence under the Innovations for Defense Excellence (iDEX) scheme to manufacture miniaturised multi-payload satellites for the Indian Air Force.

Pixxel also rolled in funds as it bagged $24 Mn in its Series B funding round. On the operational front, the company this year also announced the launch of its commercial satellite constellation, called Fireflies, slated for launch early next year. 

Not stopping there, the company also submitted its bid for building and managing a space-based earth observation (EO) system for Indian authorities.

Founded in 2018 by Awais Ahmed and Kshitij Khandelwal, Pixxel is building a constellation of hyperspectral earth imaging satellites to detect, monitor and predict critical global phenomenon across sectors such as agriculture, mining, environment, among others.

Apple Floats First R&D Subsidiary In India

Having aggressively ramped up its manufacturing capabilities in the country for the past few years, Apple took the next logical step in its India evolution in 2024. The year saw the big tech major mark its first direct presence in the country as it set up its maiden research and development (R&D) subsidiary in India. 

Called Apple Operations India, the new arm will also focus on research, design, testing and providing support to third party manufacturers. 

The new subsidiary marks a turning point for Apple in India. Moving on from just assembling iPhones in India, the new subsidiary signifies Cupertino-based juggernaut’s bid to increase the share of locally-made components, manufacture critical parts in the country and shore up its India manufacturing stack. 

Not just this, the year also saw Apple commencing the initial manufacturing of the yet-to-be-released iPhone 17 base model in India. The company plans to kick off the “introductory” production of the standard iPhone 17 in the country in the latter half of 2025 in partnership with a local vendor. 

On the operational front, Apple assembled $14 Bn worth of iPhones in India in the financial year 2023–24 (FY24). The company manufactured around 14% of its flagship devices in India last fiscal, which translated to about 1 in 7 iPhones.

Mindgrove Rolls Out India’s First Microcontroller Chip

As semiconductor mania gripped the world, India was not far behind. Despite well-capitalised global challengers, homegrown semiconductor players emerged from shadows to disrupt the chip manufacturing ecosystem. 

One of the players that led the charge back home was Mindgrove Technologies. The IIT Madras-incubated fabless semiconductor company proved to be a testament to India’s semiconductor ambitions as it debuted India’s first commercial high-performance SoC (system on chip) called Secure IoT. 

The chip is designed on open-source instruction set architecture (ISA) RISC-V and is expected to improve cost efficiency for Indian original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) for their devices such as smartwatches, smart city devices, connected home devices, EV battery management systems, among others.

Founded in 2021 by Shashwath TR and Sharan Srinivas Jagathrakshakan, Mindgrove caters to the wide gap between high-end and low-end players in the embedded systems space and uses indigenous RISC-V Shakti cores to power its chips. 

And investors found merit in its offerings too as the startup raised a hefty $8 Mn in funding towards the end of 2024 to fuel its in-house engineering capabilities and accelerate production and sales of its first chip.