Startup news and updates: daily roundup (September 8, 2025)

From AI's role in education to clean nutrition for athletes and women reclaiming India’s roads, YourStory brings you stories that highlight significant developments across sectors.

Featured stories

191 Nutrition aims to redefine sports supplements

India’s nutritional supplement industry has grown rapidly in recent years, but it falls short when it comes to the needs of serious athletes and fitness-driven individuals. 

Imported products are expensive and often lack transparency about their ingredients, while low-cost domestic alternatives are sometimes overloaded with sugar and synthetic additives, or contain poorly researched formulations, says Siddharth Singh, a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu champion and Founder of health and wellness brand 191 Nutrition. 

Lack of suitable, reliable options for athletes and health-conscious individuals impacts their sustained performance, effective recovery, and long-term wellness, adds Singh, who is India’s first competitive Black Belt expert in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and a four-time World Champion. 

To address these gaps in sports nutrition, Singh founded 191 Nutrition over three years ago with a focus on hydration, recovery, and immunity.

Read more here. 

This nonprofit is enabling women to conquer India’s roads

For the past decade, Chennai resident Sivagami has painstakingly stitched a life of dignity and security. This single mother of two children battled stigma for living without a male companion. She made barely enough by doing sewing and odd jobs to run the household. She also lived with an inherent fear of public visibility. 

Three years ago, she enrolled in a programme by Delhi-based nonprofit Azad Foundation, and this was the beginning of self-reclamation for her. 

The Women with Wheels (WWW) programme, a 17-year-long initiative by the Azad Foundation, is the brainchild of the organisation’s founder, Meenu Vadera, who had a simple but radical intent: turning driving into a dignified livelihood for women.

Read more here. 

Overreacting to AI is like over-eating: Ronnie Screwvala

Artificial Intelligence is not a curiosity to be bookmarked for later. As Ronnie Screwvala, Co-founder and Chairman of higher education and upskilling platform upGrad, puts it, AI is a “permanent shift” that will reorder what counts as valuable work, how learning is delivered, and who gets access to expertise. 

Panic is the wrong response. “Overreacting to anything is always a bad idea,” Screwvala warns—a useful corrective in a debate too often fuelled by alarm. 

There is also practical good news: AI’s biggest promise may be to multiply scarce human expertise, not merely to replace routine tasks. Screwvala explains, “With AI and bots, I can do a lot of that manually, and I can go from one person to 2,000 people.” He is referring to how technology can take over routine mentoring and feedback, freeing educators and experts to focus on deeper, more complex interactions.

Read more here.

Chhalaang 4.0 promises bigger stage for women technologists with Rs 7 lakh in prizes

On September 13, Bengaluru will witness the fourth edition of Chhalaang: The Leap Forward, one of India’s largest platforms dedicated to women in technology. Organised by HR advisory firm MetaMorph and hosted at BHIVE, the event will bring together 350+ women engineers on ground, with over 9,800+ registrations already received.

Launched in 2022 as a small internal initiative, Chhalaang has grown into a nationwide movement. 

Born out of the understanding that many women face structural barriers—career breaks, maternity leave, and systemic bias—Chhalaang was envisioned not as just another coding contest, but as a space where women could innovate, connect, and step into leadership. 

Read more here. 

Funding news

Venture Catalysts raises Rs 150 Cr to launch new funds, expand leadership

Multi-stage venture investing platform Venture Catalysts has closed a Rs 150 crore (about $18 million) funding round. The new round comprised a mix of primary and secondary transactions.

The company said the fresh capital will be used to strengthen leadership, launch new funds, enhance technology, including AI-driven due diligence and LP reporting, and expand into key startup hubs globally.

The round saw participation from new investors such as Ashish Kacholia and group, Authum Investments, Aishwarya Rai, Karthik Sundar Iyer, Hardik Patel of Finquest, LNB Group, Mukul Agarwal, Shahrukh Khan Family Office, Sakal Media Group, Utpal Sheth and Vinod Dugar of RDB Group.

Read more here. 

Other news

Viasat's global STEM innovation challenge comes to India

Viasat, a satellite communications company, has introduced the India edition of the 'Viasat: Space for Good 2025' initiative, a global STEM innovation challenge for students. Following its success in the US and UK, Viasat has collaborated with BSNL and government agencies for the India edition.

The India finalist event will take place in Delhi on September 26, featuring university-level students.

The India finalists bring a diversity of innovative ideas and personal stories, which include orbital manufacturing hubs, sustainable asteroid resource mining, electromagnetic satellite propulsion, intelligent space debris tracking, plasma-based communication systems, and emergency satellite-based SOS networks.

Nutrify Today opens NutrifyGenie AI to SMEs and start-ups

Nutrify Today is opening the full capabilities of its flagship NutrifyGenie AI platform to India’s small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and startups. The move, unveiled at the Bharat Nutraverse platform by founder and chief catalyst Amit Srivastava, aims to democratise product development and compliance tools traditionally available only to large pharmaceutical, OTC and FMCG players.

NutrifyGenie AI integrates ingredient scouting, formulation design, claims validation, regulatory guardrails and commercialisation planning into a single workflow, reducing costly rework and speeding compliant launches.

By extending enterprise-grade capabilities to SMEs—often the drivers of category innovation but constrained by limited resources—Nutrify Today positions the platform as a catalyst for 'responsible nutrition', with safer, evidence-backed products better equipped for both domestic and global markets.

HCLTech appoints Amitabh Kant as Independent Director

HCLTech has appointed Amitabh Kant as an Independent Director with effect from September 8, 2025.

Amitabh Kant is a governance reformer and a public policy change agent. He was most recently India’s G20 Sherpa.

His leadership as Sherpa during India’s G20 Presidency (2022-2023) culminated in the unanimous adoption of the historic New Delhi Leaders’ Declaration, which galvanised global consensus around issues such as driving global growth, promulgating India’s model of digital public infrastructure, and advocating ambitious reforms in climate finance, geopolitics, and technology.

“HCLTech is among the finest corporate institutions in India. I am pleased to be part of its growth journey and look forward to working with the Board,” said Amitabh Kant. 

Carbon Capture Company enters Indian market to support net-zero goals

Carbon Capture Company (CCC), a UAE carbon capture and storage platform, is expanding into India to accelerate decarbonisation in oil and gas, steel, and cement—sectors that together account for over 35% of the country’s CO2 emissions.

The company will provide end-to-end CCS solutions, decarbonisation advisory, and policy support, while fostering innovation partnerships, pilot programmes, and skills training. With India’s 26 sedimentary basins offering 291 gigatonnes of CO₂ storage potential, CCC plans to co-develop projects with public and private partners.

Resilience AI powers Delhi’s Heat Action Plan with real-time risk mapping

Resilience AI, a disaster-tech intelligence platform, has partnered with the Delhi Heat Action Plan to deliver AI-driven solutions for combating intensifying heatwaves in the capital. Developed by the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), Ministry of Home Affairs, and the Delhi Disaster Management Authority (DDMA) with support from UNEP, UNICEF and Rocky Mountain Institute, the 2025 plan covers all 11 districts.

Resilience AI’s Resilience360™ will assess heat risk across more than 9,000 structures, generating hyperlocal heat hotspot profiles and exposure maps. These insights will guide interventions such as cool roofs, shaded shelters and passive cooling zones in the city’s most vulnerable areas.

Trovex.ai launches sales enablement solution

Trovex.ai, a Bengaluru-based tech startup, has introduced its AI-led sales enablement platform, which aims to help enterprises accelerate onboarding, improve win rates and ensure consistency in customer conversations. This platform creates realistic customer replicas that sales representatives can engage in various real market scenarios, which allows for a feedback mechanism that points out the strengths and weaknesses.

The startup is currently focused on the Indian market with plans to get into the Middle East and Southeast Asia next year. It is also working on newer product innovations such as real-time AI coaching during live customer calls, vertical-specific roleplays for pharmaceuticals and enterprise SaaS sectors, and multilingual simulation capabilities.

750AD Healthcare starts five new product segments

750AD Healthcare has announced the launch of five new product divisions — Levitate, Bamwoodo, La Ravaya, Health Bull, and Solbacca. Leviate is an ayurvedic wellness range, Bamwoodo is focused on baby skincare, La Ravaya on dermatology and beauty care, health bull is focused on sexual wellness range and Solbacca on nutrition.

(The copy will be updated with the latest news throughout the day.)