Info Edge reveals its AI and deeptech bets, and stays honest about the early scorecard

Info Edge has, for the first time, put a formal number on its bets in artificial intelligence and deeptech, revealing that it has deployed Rs 1,003 crore across 54 startups in these two sectors since 2020. The disclosure came in a letter to shareholders filed with the National Stock Exchange and the BSE on 22 June 2026, in which the company carved out its AI and deeptech investments as a standalone book for the first time, separate from its larger consumer technology portfolio. The numbers offer the clearest view yet of how one of India's most closely watched investors is positioning for the decade ahead.

Best known as an early backer of Eternal, the parent of Zomato and Blinkit, and of insurance aggregator PB Fintech, Info Edge runs its startup investing through Redstart Labs, the deeptech fund Capital 2B, and three Info Edge Ventures funds. The company says it began investing in AI and deeptech around 2020, well before the global AI wave turned these themes into a consensus bet, entering areas such as robotics, biotech and space tech ahead of most generalist investors.

The AI and deeptech scorecard

Of the Rs 1,003 crore, Rs 614 crore has gone into 28 AI companies, a book now carried at Rs 1,268 crore. That works out to a 2.1x multiple and an estimated gross internal rate of return of about 31%. Of these, 26 are active and 15 have raised externally led follow-on rounds from investors such as Insight Partners, Peak XV, SIG and Vertex. The deeptech portfolio is younger and smaller, with Rs 455 crore deployed across 30 companies, most of them backed at the research and IP stage. It is carried at Rs 559 crore, a 1.2x multiple and roughly 15% gross IRR, with 13 of the 30 having raised external rounds. The largest deeptech holding is Unbox Robotics, a profitable warehouse swarm-robotics firm that has closed a Series B.

Several portfolio companies are now tied to flagship government programmes. Voice AI startup Gnani.ai was selected under the IndiaAI Mission to help build sovereign voice models and received Rs 177 crore of government GPU compute credits. Two deeptech firms, electric aircraft maker ePlane and satellite propulsion startup Manastu Space, secured the country's first allocations under the Research, Development and Innovation (RDI) Scheme, with ePlane taking the single largest national allocation at Rs 285 crore and Manastu Space Rs 115 crore. Those allocations are conditional on the startups raising matching capital from investors.

The AI and deeptech book remains young next to Info Edge's consumer technology portfolio, where Rs 2,755 crore invested across 45 companies is now carried at Rs 37,214 crore, a 13.5x return built largely on Eternal and PB Fintech. Across all sectors, the company has deployed about Rs 4,900 crore in 135 startups, now valued at roughly Rs 41,300 crore.

What the early returns actually tell us

When a venture investor says a portfolio is worth more than the money put into it, that higher value usually rests on the price a later investor paid in a fresh funding round, not on cash that has been banked. Info Edge revises a company's value upward only when an outside investor enters at a higher valuation, or an independent valuer agrees the business merits it, and marks it down when a company underperforms or raises at a lower price.

This is why the company calls its current gains intermediate markups rather than profits. A 2.1x multiple on the AI book reads well, but it stays on paper until the companies are sold or go public.

Founder and Executive Vice Chairman Sanjeev Bikhchandani is candid about this in the letter, writing that early-stage investing needs seven to ten years to show real results, that he treats interim return figures with a generous pinch of salt, and that several portfolio companies still carry early-stage mortality risk despite being marked up.

That caution is the point. Info Edge frames its approach as patient capital, staying invested longer than most are willing to, and expects India to increasingly build globally relevant technology companies rather than ones meant only for the home market. The real test of the AI and deeptech book lies in whether any of these 54 companies grows into the kind of outlier that Zomato and PB Fintech became, an outcome that will only be clear years from now.