Vertical short drama OTT, starting in Telegu. $5M seed round. The co-founders have built Chai Bisket over the past decade, a producer of web series (with 10M YouTube followers) and shows for OTTs in Telegu. Comps: Flick TV (also funded this week, see No. 10 below), Kuku TV, ShareChat’s QuickTV, Reel Saga, Reelies and global players, largely from China.

Home décor and kitchen brand sold D2C, now expanding into offline retail. The company has a range of 250 products. Currently at ₹120CR ARR, ₹150CR targeted by Dec 2025, ₹200CR by Mar 2026. $2.2M in what appears to be the company's first round, a Pre-Series A. The two co-founders are brothers, one of whom started out of college, the other ran a digital marketing agency for four years.

DeFi startup offering non-custodial crypto wallet services, offered through a crypto debit card for customers in the Middle East, SE Asia and LatAm; and for Indian users a one-tap fiat-to-crypto on-ramp. ₹5CR pre-seed round from a single angel. The founder started PlutoPe in 2022, no prior information available on his background.

Microbiome-based life sciences company, with a customer facing solution to improve gut health. ₹4CR pre-seed round. Founders: CEO Bipin was co-founder at Gaia Smart Cities (IOT devices for trains and airports); the Chief of Science and Technology has been a Senior Research Scientist at The Systems Biology Institute in Japan for 17 years; and the CEO of SBX Technologies (Japan) for a decade; Hiroaki Kitano, the Chief of Research and Collaboration, is the Head of the The Systems Biology Institute.

Cybersecurity firm that simulates real world attacks on AI systems for enterprise. $1.2M seed round. Angels in the round: Charlie Songhurst (board member at Meta), Vivek Raghavan (Sarvam.ai), Satya Vyas (Project Hero). The two co-founders were at IIT Roorkee together before founding Repello. They built Strello (enabling chat with users on the same website) for a year prior to this during college. SF and Bengaluru based.

Wealth-tech startup originally incubated within Uni Cards. Launched this April, the DIY app offers mutual fund investments to retail investors, as well as research tools and portfolio management tools. Power Mutual Funds, its flagship product, is tracking ₹3,000 crore in assets for 25K customers. $7.1M seed round. Other investors in the round: 8i Ventures, DeVC. The Founder & CEO Prateek was Co-Founder & CPO at Uni Cards for five years; prior to which he had a range of roles at Ola for close to five years.

Gaming consoles. A smart bat tracks a player's real-world shots, resulting in virtual shots within the MetaShot game. Bengaluru based. ₹2CR convertible round, following on a ₹11CR seed round (equity + debt) raised in January from Sauce VC, Sharrp Ventures and Panthera Peak. ~₹3.5CR raised at pre-seed from IPV in 2023.

DeepTech-driven contract manufacturing startup, offering on-demand manufacturing using advanced robotics for the pharma and wellness industry. Manufacturing is scalable, FDA compliant and offers customers a full suite from product development to commercial production. Has scaled production for 120 products, for clients in India, the US and MENA. $2.2 million seed round. The two co-founders were at IISc together. Prior to this, they ran Fermedicius Labs Retail Robotics together - consumer facing robotic solutions for food service & retail.

Fuel payment platform for US trucking fleet operators, which aims to eliminate rampant card fraud and inflated retail pricing. Drivers make payments by a QR code on the Piston app, which ties each transaction to the vehicle's time/location/fuel type. Piston currently serves 120 fleets across 800 fuel stations. It is processing $20M in annualised spends and growing 50% month on month. Based in the US, its Calcutta office has a 25 member team. $6.1M seed round. The two co-founders have been fleet operators themselve. Prior to this, Co-Founder & CEO Vikram was with Applied Materials for over a decade in electrical engineering roles and was the Head of BD at Beans.ai. Co-Founder & COO Shivam ran Yavanna Retail, an apparels manufactuer in Calcutta, for seven years and was also a partner at Augment Ventures, an early stage fund in Calcutta. He then set up a recruitment agency for last mile delivery in the US.

Vertical short drama OTT, planning to launch with 100 original titles. $2.3M seed round. The two co-founders were at BITS and IIM Bangalore together. CEO Kushal was VP, Content & Product at Eloelo and Associate Director, ShareChat; his co-founder Pratik was Senior Director, Growth at Pocket FM and Associate Director, Growth at Meesho.