Republic Day 2026: The Indian startups building strategic tech for the world

India’s technology landscape is undergoing a decisive shift. After years of being defined largely by consumer-facing innovation, the country is now seeing a new wave of startups building core technologies that hold national and global strategic value.

This Republic Day, the spotlight is on a new cohort of Indian startups operating at the intersection of deeptech, defence, and artificial intelligence. These companies are solving hard problems, such as space access, national security, advanced AI, and critical infrastructure, often with long development cycles, high capital intensity, and global relevance.

From private launch vehicles to indigenous defence platforms and AI systems trained for real-world complexity, these startups signal a broader transition: India is moving from being a technology consumer to a technology builder for the world.

As India marks its 77th Republic Day, this list highlights five such startups that are shaping the country’s strategic future while contributing to global technology progress. Their journeys underscore how deep-tech innovation from India is no longer a distant ambition but a present reality, one that will influence industries, governments, and missions far beyond our borders.

Skyroot Aerospace

Skyroot Aerospace, founded in 2018 by former ISRO engineers Pawan Kumar Chandana and Naga Bharath Daka, is one of India’s foremost private spacetech companies focused on small-satellite launch vehicles. Headquartered in Hyderabad, it develops the Vikram series of carbon-composite rockets, built entirely in private facilities such as the MAX-Q headquarters and Infinity campus.

Skyroot’s primary offering is on-demand launch services for small satellites through Vikram-I, capable of carrying up to 350 kg to LEO or 260 kg to SSO, supported by solid boosters and 3D-printed liquid engines.

The company operates from India but serves a global customer base through strategic international partnerships. Collaborations with Sweden’s SSC have enabled ground tracking for Vikram-I missions from Western Australia, with potential use of the Esrange Space Center. Agreements with Germany’s Exolaunch, Japan’s ispace, Australia’s HEX20, and Axiom Space in the US have broadened integration, deployment, lunar services, and LEO research capabilities.

With over $95 million in funding and a growing workforce, Skyroot contributes to India’s role in the worldwide small-satellite market by offering accessible launch capacity and strengthening cross-border spacetech collaboration.

Mindgrove Technologies

Mindgrove Technologies is an Indian fabless semiconductor startup designing high-performance system-on-chips (SoCs) for consumer electronics, automotive, industrial IoT, and defence applications. Founded in 2022 by semiconductor veteran Karthik Gurumurthy (ex-Texas Instruments, MosChip), the company is headquartered in Hyderabad.

Mindgrove focuses on indigenous chip design, with products such as secure IoT and vision-focused SoCs built for edge computing use cases, including CCTV systems, dashcams, and smart devices. By developing locally designed silicon, the startup aims to reduce reliance on imported chip IP while improving cost efficiency and deployment timelines for manufacturers.

Backed by $8 million in Series A funding, Mindgrove is scaling its R&D efforts and positioning India as a meaningful contributor to the global semiconductor supply chain.

ideaForge

ideaForge Technology is one of India’s most established unmanned aerial systems (UAS) companies, co-founded in 2007 by IIT Bombay alumni Ankit Mehta, Rahul Singh, and Ashish Bhat, with Vipul Joshi joining soon after.

Headquartered in Navi Mumbai with R&D and manufacturing facilities in Bengaluru and strategic presences abroad, the company designs, develops, engineers, and manufactures in-house autonomous drones for defence, surveillance, mapping, and industrial use.

ideaForge’s platforms — including VTOL and hybrid systems such as SWITCH and advanced tactical models like ZOLT — are widely deployed in India and abroad. Its drones have logged hundreds of thousands of missions, and the company was ranked third globally among dual-use (civil + defence) drone makers in 2024 by Drone Industry Insights.

The startup has secured significant contracts from the Indian Army — over Rs 100 crore in recent orders for next-generation tactical drones.

ideaForge also continues to expand its global footprint through partnerships and joint ventures, such as the US-based First Forge with First Breach Inc., aimed at local UAV manufacturing and supply for defence and security markets.

Sarvam AI

Founded in 2023 by Vivek Raghavan and Pratyush Kumar—both of whom have played key roles in India’s digital public infrastructure through their work at UIDAI and the AI4Bharat initiative—Sarvam AI is a Bengaluru-headquartered startup focused on building full-stack generative AI for India’s linguistic and cultural diversity.

The company is developing foundational language and speech models such as Sarvam 2B, positioned as India’s first open-source small language model for Indic languages, and Shuka 1.0, an audio-first large language model supporting more than 10 Indian languages.

In April 2025, Sarvam was selected under the Government of India’s IndiaAI Mission to contribute to the development of the country’s first indigenous foundational large language model, backed by access to a 4,000-GPU compute cluster—placing it at the centre of India’s sovereign AI efforts.

Beyond domestic use cases, Sarvam’s work has global relevance in addressing non-English and low-resource language markets, a gap in current AI systems. The startup has partnered with Microsoft to build Indic voice models on Azure and is part of the global AI Alliance led by Meta and IBM, aimed at advancing open and responsible AI.

Sarvam has raised $41 million in seed and Series A funding as of December 2023 from investors including Lightspeed Venture Partners, Peak XV Partners, and Khosla Ventures, and is currently focused on deep R&D and infrastructure scaling rather than rapid commercialisation.

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QNu Labs

Founded in 2016 by Sunil Gupta, Srinivasa Rao Aluri, Mark Mathias, and Anil Prabhakar, QNu Labs is a Bengaluru-based deeptech startup bringing quantum physics into the core of modern cybersecurity.

The company focuses on building quantum-safe security solutions across quantum key distribution (QKD), quantum random number generation (QRNG), and post-quantum cryptography (PQC), aimed at protecting data and communications in a future where quantum computers could render today’s encryption obsolete.

QNu’s work sits at the intersection of national security, critical infrastructure, and enterprise cybersecurity, aligning closely with India’s National Quantum Mission while also addressing rising global demand for quantum-resilient systems.

The company has been positioning its products for international markets, particularly in the US and Europe. In December 2023, QNu Labs raised $6.5 million in a Pre-Series A1 round led by Ashish Kacholia, with participation from Speciale Invest, to fund R&D, overseas expansion, and potential satellite-based QKD initiatives.

In 2025, it also launched QNu Academy to help build talent and awareness in quantum cybersecurity, reflecting the growing skills gap in this emerging field.