DeepTech Startup Aeronero Secures $1.5M to Scale Breakthrough Air-to-Water Technology

Aeronero, a Chennai-based deep-tech startup focused on solving global water scarcity, has raised $1.5 million in a landmark funding round led by Callapina Capital and Rezwan Razack of Prestige Group. Here's a breakdown of what makes this round—and the company—so compelling:

Key Highlights of the Funding Round

• Lead Investors: Callapina Capital and Rezwan Razack (MD, Prestige Properties) 
• Co-Investors: SAN ANGELS, Jamwant Ventures, and prominent HNIs including:
• Kiran Deshpande (Former CEO, Tech Mahindra)
• S. Ramadorai (Former CEO & Vice Chairman, TCS)
• Purpose: To scale Aeronero’s patented Air Water Generators (AWGs)—devices that extract clean, alkaline drinking water directly from the atmosphere.

Why It Matters

• 13 Global Patents: Many already commercialized, backing a robust tech platform.
• 400% YoY Growth: Driven by demand across homes, offices, and military outposts.
• ₹30 Crore Order Book: With ambitions to hit a ₹100 crore topline.
• Production Scale-Up: Targeting 2,000 units/month from in-house manufacturing

Impact & Vision

• Mission: “Water for All, Always”—a decentralized, sustainable approach to water access.
• Technology: AWGs use a 5-step filtration system including Biovitae™ and mineralization to produce alkaline water (pH 7–8.5) free of bacteria, viruses, and chemicals.
• Smart Features: IoT-enabled systems offer real-time monitoring, alerts, and performance tracking.

Investor Endorsements

Vinod Jose, Callapina Capital: “The most disruptive innovation the water sector has seen in a century.”

Rezwan Razack, Prestige Group: “Aeronero’s tech is key to sustainable infrastructure.”

Kiran Deshpande: “We are proud users of Aeronero’s ‘Bubble’ system.”

S. Ramadorai: “Drinkable water from thin air—visionary and scientific in equal measure.”

Source - The Tribune | Business Standard 

Chennai Startup Mindgrove Launches India's 1st Commercial System on Chip (SoC)

Chennai headquartered Mindgrove Technologies, a semiconductor startup backed by Peak XV Partners, has introduced Secure IoT, India's first commercial System on Chip (SoC) designed specifically for Internet of Things (IoT) devices.

Named as Secure IoT, this high-performance SoC is tailored for controlling applications on a wide range of connected smart devices. It offers programmability, flexibility, security, and superior computing power. Notably, it operates at a clock speed of 700 MHz.

Secure IoT is expected to be priced approximately 30% lower than other chips in similar segments. By using this chip, local Indian companies can reduce the cost of their devices without compromising on high-end features.

Under its applications, the SoC can control various devices, including wearables like smartwatches, smart city devices (such as connected electricity, water, and gas meters), connected home devices (like smart locks, fans, and speakers), as well as electric vehicle (EV) battery management systems and control systems.

The company said it is the only Indian chip that is commercially available in this segment. Mindgrove is now looking for all Indian OEMs and ODMs who might be interested.

Availability: The chip has successfully undergone an MPW tape-out (prototyping) at the 28nm node, and reference boards will be available for original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) to test in the coming weeks.

Mindgrove Technologies not only sells the chip but also offers design support to Indian brands, helping accelerate innovation and production scale within India. It also designs specialized Al accelerators for edge computing. These chips are optimized for running machine learning models directly on devices, reducing latency and enhancing privacy. Applications include smart cameras, robotics, and industrial automation.

Backed by IITM Pravartak Technologies Foundation and incubated in the IIT-Madras Incubation Cell, Mindgrove aims to put India on the map for semiconductor design. Leveraging the SHAKTI open-source processor program, the startup create new possibilities and keep the world on the edge

India's growing demand for microchips, coupled with the need for cost-effective solutions, makes Secure IoT a significant milestone in the country's semiconductor industry. Global buyers may also find this new option from India appealing.

Audit SaaS Startup AuditCue Emerges from Stealth Mode; Raises $1.5 Mn in Seed Round Led By Kalaari Capital

• Round also saw participation from Java Capital & SF based angels
• Funds raised will be used for building the product and expanding the GTM & Engineering team
• Aims to expand in primary geographic markets of North America, India & EU
• AuditCue is a SaaS product that reimagines how risks, controls & audits work together. It removes friction from audits and empowers auditors & auditees through the entire lifecycle of risk & audit programs

Chennai-based AuditCue, an audit & risk SaaS startup, has raised $1.5 Million in a seed funding round led by Kalaari Capital. Other investors who participated include Java Capital and angel investors from San Francisco. The capital infusion will be allocated towards product development, accelerating the go-to-market strategy, and growing the engineering team

Founded in 2022 by Gaurav Kulkarni and Naren Janakiraman, AuditCue calibrates, guides and streamlines all actions that are a part of an audit lifecycle. AuditCue transforms the risk & audit experience for auditors & auditees both. The startup elevates customers’ audit & risk programs, speeds up audit cycles and improves process resiliency without compromising on agility. The elegant, simple & intuitive UX paired with its flexible and modular platform is what sets AuditCue apart from legacy solutions and market incumbents.

Gaurav Kulkarni, Co-founder & CEO, Auditcue says, “AuditCue is built for CISOs in regulated markets who keep pace with multiple compliance regimes. Unlike legacy solutions or automation products, AuditCue removes friction from audits and empowers auditors & auditees through the entire lifecycle of risk & audit programs. We are transforming the risk & audit experience for our customers to make audits seamless. With this funding round, we aim to expand further into our primary geographic markets of North America, India & EU.”

Vani Kola, Founder & Managing Director, Kalaari Capital, says “The $120B global audit and GRC market is ripe for disruption with new-age tools. The founding team brings complementary skills and we are excited to back their vision.”

AuditCue has been in stealth mode until now, working with industry experts & advisors to reimagine how risks, audits & controls work together. With this round, the company is gearing up to open up access to their solution for companies that are looking for a better way to manage risks & compliance.

Companies understand the importance of a risk & audit program but most still struggle to find the right solution to implement. Legacy solutions add more complexity to processes instead of simplifying them for companies, whereas other incumbents try a one-size-fits-all approach. But companies need a tailored approach to risk and a solution flexible enough to address their unique challenges and needs, and that’s what AuditCue is building.

About AuditCue

AuditCue’s mission is to transform the risk & audit experience for auditors & auditees both. Our SaaS solution elevates our customers’ audit & risk programs, speeds up audit cycles and improves process resiliency without compromises on agility. The elegant, simple & intuitive UX paired with its flexible and modular platform is what sets AuditCue apart from legacy solutions and market incumbents. For more details about AuditCue and our transformative GRC platform, please visit www.auditcue.com.

Digital Lending Software Co. Cloudbankin Raises $400K in Funding from Upekkha, Kube VC and Others

Chennai-based CloudBankIN, an end-to-end end-to-end cloud-based loan software company, raised $400K in funding from Angel investors, Upekkha, SaaS accelerator and fund, and Kube VC - a global venture capital firm, reported media outlets.

The round also saw participation from Mr. Ramanathan RV, CEO at Hyperface, Mr. Mohan Karuppiah, CEO at IppoPay and Mr. Magendra Negi, Head of Alliances & Partnerships (Financial Services Solutions).

The company will use the freshly raised funds to enhance its AI based low-code platform to enable customisable workflow and pluggable integrations for different financial products.

CloudBankIN was formerly known as Habile Technologies. It is an innovative digital lending platform that aims to drive excellence in the Fintech ecosystem by helping financial institutions go paperless and achieve end-to-end solutions in no time

Led by CEO Mani Parthasarathy, an engineering graduate from Madras Institute of Technology, CloudBankIN provides financial institutions with a comprehensive digital lending software solution featuring low-code digital onboarding, a loan origination system, a loan management system and a business rule engine.

With its software, CloudBankIN claims to disburse loans in 10 minutes. The software provides seamless and scalable integration and automates the process and furnishes a configurable workflow management.

India's 1st Processor IP Company Incore Semiconductors Raises $3 Mn in Seed Funding from Sequoia India

Chennai-based InCore Semiconductors, India's first Processor IP company, has raised $3M in seed funding from Sequoia India.

The funding will support the company's mission to build innovative RISC-V processor cores and contribute to India's growing semiconductor industry. InCore will use the raised funds to enhance its portfolio of Core-Hub generators and reference SoC (System-on-Chip) platforms aimed at multiple segments of the embedded chips space.

To recall, prior to InCore Semiconductors, Sequoia India has invested in $2.325 funding round of MindGrove Technologies, also a Chennai-based semiconductor startup. 

InCore is building proprietary in-house developed family of RISC-V core generators. RISC-V is an open standard instruction set architecture based on established reduced instruction set computer principles. Unlike most other ISA designs, RISC-V is provided under royalty-free open-source licenses.

InCore’s RISC-V Core-Hub Generators are software tools that generate hardware designs based on proprietary RISC-V processors. These generators provide a quick and efficient way to create customized processor cores that meet specific requirements. They enable developers to configure the processor's microarchitecture to meet specific application needs, which is an extension of the RISC-V’s philosophy of configurable and modular architecture is essential in today's rapidly changing computing landscape.

Launched in 2018, by Neel Gala, G S Madhusudan, Arjun Menon, and Gautam Doshi, InCore enables its customers with turnkey processor IP solutions for strategic industrial segments like automotive, industrial automation, and general electronics.

Currently based at IIT-Madras Research Park, Incore’s team has earlier worked for India’s ambitious indigenous processors "Project Shakti" at IIT Madras, and are well-renowned experts in the R&D and industrial corridors.

Chennai-based Fintech Startup Finsire Raises $1.3 Mn in Seed Funding

Lending Infratech and asset collateralization API Fintech Company Finsire' announced that it has raised $1.3M in seed funding from Strategic Investors.

The round saw participation from iSeed, Spark Capital, Devx, 1947 Rise, Adept ventures, Portal Angel Investors, Purple Matters, DeVC India, Lets Ventures, Shashank Kumar and Harshil Mathur, Co-Founders of Razorpay and Mars Shot Ventures, Co- founder of M2P Fintech, MadhuR, Prabhu R and Muthu A, Lalit Keshre, CEO Groww, Maninder G, CSO, OYO, Justin Caldbeck, Co-Founder Binary Capital, Abhinav Sinha, COO & CPO, OYO, Mr. Mohan K, Co-Founder & CEO, IppoPay, Pratekk Agarwal from Growthcap Ventures, Abhishek Goyal, Tracxn, Founder, Abhishek Rungta Founder, Indus Net Tech, Rahul Mathur, Founder,Verak, Meet Semlani, Co-founder,Tartan, Amit Goel, Founder, Medici.

Finsire builds lending enablement services by permitting digital assets to be taken as collateral. The solution allows Banks, NBFCs, fintechs, credit requirement distribution, and depositaries to maximise their lending capabilities.

The world is filled with asset classes. The United States household holds 150 trillion dollars of assets, the Indian household holds about 14 trillion dollars with it, and globally it's about 400 trillion dollars. The market opportunity is huge by any standard of imagination. Asset holders just need convenient, trustable, and options to pledge their assets.

Mr. Shreyans Nahar, CEO and Co-founder of Finsire, said, “Excited to build the Digitized secured infrastructure for India. Once in a lifetime opportunity for us; Indian households hold over 14 trillion dollars in assets, and global households' assets are over 400 trillion dollars. Today these assets are extremely hard to pledge. The idea is to allow the asset holder to do what they wish to do with these assets.”

Mr. Shiva Singh Sangwan, Founder, 1947Rise commented, "Finsire is building the secured credit Infrastructure for India by collateralizing the vast majority of the assets available in the country. Digitizing these is a long game. I am super excited that Shreyans decided to move back to India to build Finsire from India."

Commenting on the funding, Mr Meet Semlani, Co-founder, Tartan said, “Shreyans, Mridul and Subu are building a once in a generation company. In today's economic climate, it is essential to provide a supportive infrastructure for Banks, NBFCs and Fintech institutions that rely on assets and income as collateral. These businesses form the backbone of our economy, and their growth and success are vital to the prosperity of our society. Moreover, providing access to capital and financing through asset-based lending can help bridge the gap between traditional banking and underserved communities, allowing for greater inclusion and economic mobility. In short, investing in infrastructure for asset and income-backed companies is not only a smart choice—it is the need of the hour."

The world is filled with asset classes. The United States household holds 150 trillion dollars of assets, the Indian household holds about 14 trillion dollars with it, and globally it's about 400 trillion dollars. The market opportunity is huge by any standard of imagination. Asset holder’s just need convenient, trustable, and options to pledge their assets.

About Finsire

Finsire is Lending Infrastructure tech to collateralize digital assets. Focused on building and digitizing the Infra rails from various assets and innovating in this space with asset originators, depositaries and lenders.

India's 1st Manless Takeaway Launched by Chennai Based Food Start up BVK Biryani in Chennai

Plans afoot for 12 more centres across Chennai & operations pan India. Company also announces 60 min delivery across Chennai for all orders on its "BVK APP"

Chennai based start-up BVK Biryani that serves authentic premium Wedding style Biryani freshly cooked with few hours of farm-to-fork meat, has launched first-of-its kind, unique state of art unmanned takeaway ordering experience centre in Kolattur, Chennai. Touted to be the Indias 1st and a unique experience for Biryani Lovers, the process itself promises to be is as simple as it is unique. Now Customers with Biryani hunger pangs can just walk in and not only satiate their hunger but experience a fast and amazing ordering experience. Just place your order on a 32" attractive and legible Display - Make payment by card or UPI - Watch the countdown timer - and Bingo! collect your popped-out freshly packed Order. All just in a jiffy. No Waiting and no one to talk to and explain. Just order and walk or drive away with your favourite Biryani to enjoy.

Indias 1st manless takeaway launched by BVK biryani in chennai

Started in 2020, BVK Biryani had lived up to its promise of maintaining the freshness of the cut though it was by far the most challenging factor in the restaurant business. The unique taste of their Muslim Wedding style Biryani come from their secret mix of spices and ingredients which are ground in-house everyday as per requirements. Nothing is pre-bought and stored. The Biryani continued to be served in eco-friendly reusable tin containers. True to their promise, the Company has now scaled up to offer 60-minute delivery across Chennai and hopes to further scale up to 30 min delivery in days to come. Ordering can be done online by either booking on their website www.thebvkbiryani.com or from their app "The BVK Biryani" available on google play and IOS app store. Orders can also be placed on Swiggy and Zomato food ordering apps.

For more details, please visit: www.thebvkbiryani.com.

Future Plans

The three-year-old biryani-centric food start-up, has raised the bar once again by its twin announcements. Launching the Indias first unmanned Takeaway Ordering facility and scaling up to offer 60 min guaranteed delivery for all orders on its homegrown BVK App. According to its Founder & CEO Mr. Faheem S the company has plans to launch 12 such centres across Chennai and later scale up its operations pan India.

IIT Madras Incubated Semiconductor Startup Mindgrove Raises $2.32 Mn in Seed Funding

Chennai-based Semiconductor startup MindGrove Technologies has secured $2.325 million in seed funding led by Sequoia Capital India.

Other investors who participated in the round include Speciale Invest and Whiteboard Capital, as well as Ashwini Asokan, CEO of Mad Street Den, and Nischay Goel, CIO of Duro Capital, who participated in their personal.

Mindgrove designs state-of-the-art, scalable, and reliable System-on-Chips (SOCS) in India. These high-performance chips can be leveraged in power-constrained environments such as industrial automation, automotive, consumer electronics, defense, security, and aviation.

Founded in 2021, by Shashwath T. R. and Sharan Srinivas J., Mindgrove design cost and power-effective microprocessor technology in India, for the world. Mindgrove is backed by IIT Madras Incubation Cell, and IITM Pravartak Technologies Foundation, a DST, Govt of India funded section 08 company housing the Technology Innovation Hub on Sensors, Networking, Actuators, and Control Systems (SNACS).

Mindgrove designs state-of-the-art, scalable, and reliable System-on-Chips (SOCs) in India. These high-performance chips can be leveraged in power-constrained environments such as industrial automation, automotive, consumer electronics, defense, security, and aviation.

Mindgrove’s series of 3 SoCs - System on Chips - are designed specifically for Edge signal processing and vision applications. They are based on the 'Shakti' core microprocessor which is amongst India’s first industrial grade microprocessors. Shakti was developed at the Reconfigurable Intelligent Systems Engineering (RISE) Lab at IIT Madras, under the Digital India RISC-V program funded by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) .

About the founders of Mindgrove, Shashwath is an electronics engineer by training. A graduate from SRM Engineering college, Shashwath worked at Lucid Software from 2006 to 2021. Lucid provides Non Destructive Testing (NDT) services to various heavy industries.

During his 15 year stint at Lucid, Shashwath developed specialised ultrasound devices, drivers and computer vision algorithms for the nuclear, oil and gas and the aerospace industry. He is an expert in systems engineering, signal processing and machine vision software.

While, Sharan is a computer scientist with an undergraduate degree in Computer Science from Meenakshi Sundararajan Engineering College, Anna University (2012) and a masters degree in Computational Science from ETH Zurich.

At ETH Zurich, Sharan developed an interest in programming for high performance scientific applications. He worked at Lucid Software from 2016-2021 where he developed CUDA/OpenCL programs running on NVIDIA GPUs. At Lucid, Sharan got a taste of hardware and embedded programming, and also met Shashwath.

Mindgrove's journey so far has been made possible by a unique government - academia - industry collaboration. The semiconductor industry itself is a global industry and such collaborations have yielded high returns for countries like Japan, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan in the last few decades.

Chennai based IoT solutions company Denvik Technology raises strategic investment round for global expansion

Denvik Technology will use this investment to expand global office footprint to better serve customers looking for cutting-edge Industrial IoT solutions, scale the team and accelerate commercialization of their new product for the global poultry farming market

Denvik Technology, a Chennai-based provider of cutting-edge IoT solutions has raised a strategic investment round led by CI Hub, an investment firm that invests growth capital in high potential Indian companies to help them accelerate their global expansion. The investment will be used by Denvik to expand their customer base for Industrial IoT solutions further in Europe and the MENA region (Middle East, North Africa), scale the team and accelerate market adoption of their latest IoT-driven smart solution for the global poultry farming market.

The market for IoT solutions is expected to grow rapidly over the next decade. The global IoT market is projected to grow from USD 478.36 billion in 2022 to USD 2,465.26 billion by 2029 at a staggering CAGR of 26.5%. Agriculture is expected to be one of the fastest growing sectors as IoT can be leveraged to help farmers improve profitability and increase operational efficiencies. With over a decade of expertise in building cutting-edge technology solutions, Denvik Technology is well positioned to help companies leverage the granular insights that will be available from connected smart devices.

Founded in 2007, Denvik Technology has been building robust, market leading technology solutions for global corporations and startups for over 15 years. Their customers include global leaders in industrial and equipment automation in Europe and India. The team is especially passionate about leveraging technology to improve sustainability and help leave a better planet for future generations.

Denvik Technology is incubated by the Crescent Innovation Incubation Council (CIIC), the incubation arm of Crescent Institute of Science and Technology. Two of Denvik’s co-founders are alumni of the Crescent Institute of Science and Technology.

Denvik’s latest proprietary product offering “Ornithon” is an IoT driven smart solution for helping poultry farmers world-wide improve profitability, operational efficiency and compliance. Their unique technology offering leapfrogs existing market solutions and provides modern day poultry farmers a significant competitive advantage.

Commenting on the strategic investment, Syed Bukhari, Founder & Vice Chairman, Gibraltar Technologies; Founder Director, CIIC; Founder & Director, CI Hub, said “We are excited to invest in a deep-tech company like Denvik Technology with a proven track record of success. The team at Denvik have a wealth of experience in building and deploying cutting-edge, robust, easy to use IoT solutions. The global IoT market is a huge opportunity as enterprises of all sizes look to benefit from IoT technology. We believe that Denvik is uniquely positioned to grow and take advantage of this large addressable market.”

Mohammed Mohideen, Co-founder, Denvik Technology Private Limited, said “We have been successfully delivering cutting-edge technology solutions for global clients for the last 15 years. With this strategic investment, we will be expanding further in key markets like the Middle East and Europe and establish near-shore offices to better service our clients there. We will also use the investment to accelerate sales and scale adoption of our latest product offering “Ornithon” which tackles the unmet needs of poultry farmers world-wide.”

About Denvik Technology Private Limited

Chennai-based Denvik Technology Private Limited builds cutting-edge IoT solutions for global corporations and startups. The company has been in existence for over 15 years and has an established client base in Europe, Middle East and India. The team at Denvik is especially passionate about leveraging technology to improve sustainability and help leave a better planet for future generations.

About CI Hub

CI Hub is an investment firm that invests growth capital in high potential Indian companies to help them accelerate their global expansion.

About CIIC

Crescent Innovation Incubation Council (CIIC) is the incubation arm of Crescent Institute of Science and Technology. CIIC has incubated 120 startups since its inception.

Chennai-based Health Tech Startup Blod.in Raises Pre-seed Funding Led By Tamilpreneur

Blod.in, a health-tech startup based in Chennai, secured an undisclosed amount in pre-seed funding. The deal was facilitated by Tamilpreneur, led by Shyam Siddarth, Founder & CEO and Praveen Krishna, Co-founder & CMO. Prabhu Rangarajan (Co-Founder of M2P Fintech), Mohan K (Co-Founder/CEO of IppoPay),, Vijay Pravin (Co-Founder/CEO of bitsCrunch), Ashok Vardharajan (CTO of bitsCrunch), Savitha Ramasamy (Senior Scientist, Institute for Infocomm Research, A*Star), Karthick Sivaram (Co-Founder Backspace Tech), Mohammed Farouk (Vice-President at Rela Institute), and Bhopan Krishnan (Founder of Outline Systems) have also invested in the startup.

As a B2B company, Blod aims to manage healthcare data better. They have partnered
with several hospitals and blood banks across Chennai to revolutionise the healthcare sector while focusing on the haematology department. They have just introduced the beta version of their flagship product, Blod+, as the first step to meeting hospitals', haematology needs.

L-R, Adithya Vikram (Co-Founder and CTO) & Varun Nair (Founder and CEO)

According to the founder and social entrepreneur Varun Nair, "The healthcare sector is currently highly unstructured. Blod simplifies and digitises the day-to-day activities of the haematology department of hospitals. Implementing a simple change like Blod makes blood management more efficient and effective."

One of the investors, Vijay Pravin, Co-founder & CEO of bitsCrunch, says, "There are some investments you make from the pocket and some you make from the heart. Blod is one such team that could save many lives by bridging the gap between technology and blood scarcity in a country like India."

Blod plans to scale up and invest in infrastructure, expansions, and technology stacks with the capital raised. Blod is committed to positively impacting the healthcare community with innovation that can transform and aid the healthcare system in providing patients with the human body's lifeline - blood.

About Blod.in

Blod.in, a health-tech startup based in Chennai caters to the haematology department by connecting hospitals and blood banks. They aim to develop a centralised blood management system.

Learn more information, further your social service, and save lives by registering as a

donor on their website, www.blod.in.

IIT-Madras Incubated EV Motor Controller Maker Revoh Innovations Raises $150K in Seed Funding

Chennai-based Electric Vehicle sub-component manufacturing startup, Revoh Innovations Private Ltd. announced it has raised funds Rs $150,000 from Angel Investors - Vel Kanniappan and Ravi Renganathan in a seed round.

Revoh Innovations' R&D, manufacturing, and operations are based out of IIT-M Research Park and is looking forward to setting up a standalone manufacturing unit with the help of received seed funds in SIPCOT, Chennai. The R&D division will continue to function from IIT-M Research Park.

Incorporated a couple of years ago by a handful of Electronics Engineering graduates, Revoh's primary goal is to localize the electric vehicles' subcomponents' manufacturing and eventually reduce our dependence on foreign manufacturers.

"Despite numerous hurdles, our sheer perseverance kept us and will keep us going strong! Indeed, the learnings have been enormous. Whatever it takes, Revoh never gives up and will cruise through!", said Vignesh D, CEO, Revoh Innovations.

Revoh Innovations, at present, can produce 2000 motor controllers per month for various applications such as EV, healthcare, solar energy, industrial, agriculture and domestic uses. Momentarily, they have around 25+ reputed clients across MNCs and start-ups. Furthermore, they have tie-ups with several motor manufacturers in India. 

Revoh Motor Controller for E-Cycles

Revoh has also exported the BLDC controllers to clients in the UK and Netherlands. Moreover, they are in talks with clients across the US, Canada, and Australia for Global expansion. The applications of their motor controllers in the EV sector run the gamut from e-bicycles to e-scooters to e-rickshaws with 100% customizable cutting-edge features such as forward/reverse mode, walk-assist, anti-theft system, etc.!

"Revoh Innovations is one of the very few indigenous Indian firms that perform mind-bending research on motor controllers for Electric Vehicles. The level of customization that Revoh provides to their clients is truly top-notch! On top of it, they have got a very intelligent and well approachable team! Best wishes for their future endeavors!", said Ravi Renganathan.

Revoh Innovations Private Limited is an IIT Madras-incubated Electric Vehicles sub-component manufacturing start-up focusing on research and development of motor controllers for EV applications.

Revoh's motor controllers use a unique and indigenously designed control algorithm—which means all the products are 100% customizable. Moreover, Revoh's BLDC drive is India's first BLDC controller to achieve 97% efficiency! All their products are locally designed and manufactured—in other words, all the products come with a proud "Made in India" seal! Recently, Revoh developed the most compact and most efficient indigenously developed BLDC motor controller.

Chennai-based Medical Device Firm Kriya Medical Technologies Gets Manufacturing License for KRIVIDA Novus RT-PCR Kit

Kriya Medical Technologies, a medical devices company headquartered in Chennai, has received its manufacturing license from the DCGI (Drugs Controller General of India) for its product KRIVIDA Novus, an RT-PCR kit that can detect the Omicron variant and its sub-lineages in 45 minutes.

Priced at Rs 150 +taxes, the test is affordable and most suitable for entry point screening at airports. The kit is compatible with Real-Time PCR machines with a test run time of roughly 45 minutes. It provides early report to aid diagnosis and also gives precise variants to enable appropriate treatment.

KRIVIDA Novus will be produced at Kriya’s state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in Oragadam in Chennai. The company currently has a production capacity of 5 million tests per month and plans to increase it to 10 million tests per month within the next two weeks.

Anu Moturi, CEO and Founder, Kriya Medical Technologies, said, “I thank the ICMR and DCGI for their swift action. Acquiring this license is yet another milestone and a step towards our vision of making good healthcare affordable and accessible to all. Our focus is to make testing for Covid-19 variants faster, affordable and accessible to everyone, thereby enabling swift prevention and timely treatment. Since KRIVIDA Novus can detect the Omicron variant (B.1.1.529) and all its sub-lineages, such as BA.1, BA.2 and BA.3 in 45 minutes, it is most ideal and beneficial for entry point screening at airports and remobilisation of normal conditions in workplace and institutions.”

Kriya Medical Technologies has a pipeline of new products that will be released in the market over the next few months to address rapidly evolving mutations and other allied infections.

All you need to know about KRIVIDA Novus

• KRIVIDA Novus RT-PCR kit has been developed by KRIYA Medical technologies in collaboration with ImmuGenix Bioscience
• KRIVIDA Novus kit can detect COVID-19 and differentiate the other variants from Omicron in single-tube assay.
• Our KRIVIDA NOVUS kit is compatible with most Real-Time PCR machines with a test run time of 45 minutes, enabling the testing sites to conduct 2,160 tests within 24 hrs.
• The kit detects SARS-CoV-2 using five different gene targets and it has a variant specific S gene probe for the newly emerged Omicron.
• KRIVIDA Novus picks up all the sub-lineages of Omicron, such as, BA.1, BA.2 and BA.3
• The test is most suitable for entry point screening at airports

About KRIYA

KRIYA is a Make in India initiative. It’s an emerging Medical Device company headquartered in Chennai, India. The company is focused on innovating digitally integrated diagnostic solutions designed to expand access to affordable health care delivering good health for all.

Website: https://www.kriyamed.com/

PeLocal, A Chennai Based One-step Payment Platform Announces Its Launch

PeLocal, a Chennai-based digital platform has officially announced the launch of its services to aid vendors and customers with payment management.

The platform started to digitize last-mile bills and become an everyday payment app of choice for the households provides an easy and quick one-step payment option to pay multiple monthly bills which includes newspaper, milk, daily grocery, flowers, local cable or broadband, coconut, water supplies, car wash, electricity dis-coms, gas supply, and municipal corporations bills.

Pelocal, which has already hit 50k transactions within the first three months of its pilot along with digitizing last-mile bills also helps in setting up clusters that will connect with various merchant groups/associations at a local level to get more merchants on board with the digital forum.

 

Pelocal support team also assists merchants in uploading their customer base and provides any support required in transactions which include easy payment transactions requests and reminders.

"Pelocal has been started to address the last mile digital bill payments need gap. The vendor payment landscape unfortunately is still largely dominated by last-mile manual bills and transactions of paper currency. Currently, these bills are mostly paid in cash leading to various inconveniences in payments and tracking of the bills. We plan to eliminate this part of the business and completely digitalize it by providing round-the-clock services and support to replace manual bills. Also, each household has to pay multiple monthly bills in cash or in-person to the vendors, we plan to unify these payments on a single digital platform. In a nutshell, PeLocal is aimed at revolutionizing the way merchants can receive and manage payments for the services provided to consumers while at the same time bridging the gap between merchants and consumers envisioning our idea for being for ‘Vocal for Local.” Said Vivekanand Tripathi, Co-founder, and CEO of PeLocal Fintech, Pvt, Ltd.

Pelocal is currently working on scaling up its platforms to expand transaction options, add features, open more cluster offices and continue to grow in an accelerated way to be the top one-step bill payment platform in the market. Pelocal also creating a network and give comfort to customers & merchants in onboarding enterprises at local levels. These include electricity dis-coms, gas supply, municipal corporations, cable/broadband companies etc.

About PeLocal :

PeLocal is a digital software and application platform that provides fuss-free business solutions for all payment needs with a simple app. The application uses the best of technologies out present in the market to ensure seamless and fast payment settlement services for all kinds of vendor payments instantly. 

Envisioning the idea of being ‘Vocal for Local’, Pelocal aims to bridge the gap between merchants and consumers by replacing last-mile bills payment and digitizing the entire process. The application makes the lives of merchants easy by providing them a platform to manage customers, request payments, reminders to customers for payments. At the same time, the application simplifies the process for customers by providing payment options from anywhere by clicking the payment link received via an SMS, WhatsApp, or Dialer, 24/7/365 activation to improve conversion rates and resolve transaction issues faster and minimal data requirement for transactions.

Chennai-based One Hour Bazaar (1hb) Announces Successful Fund Raising for Its Online Grocery Delivery Services Launch

Chennai based One Hour Bazaar (1HB) has announced successful fund raising for its Online Grocery Delivery Services launched last year during the pandemic.  Conceived by Mr V Vijayakumar and alumni of IIT Bombay and his sister Ms Madhu Gayathri Vaithiyanathan, alumni of IIT Madras this pioneered the concept of express delivery by promising the customers delivery with an hour of order. 

With unique and distinctive technological advantages the company is well poised to offer customer delight in the coming days. Already the company has a loyal base of customers over the last one year. The company has a strong professional team drawn from Banking, logistics and retail sector.

Mr. S.V.Raja Vaidyanathan till recently the MD of Asirvad Microfinance Limited has come on Board with a 25% stake for an undisclosed sum in the company.  Mr Vijayakumar, CEO of Voice Gear Networks said that the investment will enable to reach out to another 100,000 customers from present base by offering online grocery with superior service and at affordable price. He said that the 1HB app offers ease of ordering online grocery and backed by quicker service delivery.  He conveyed that 1HB has ambitious plans and this initial funding from him and guidance will steer the company to greater heights in quick time. 

Mr S V Raja Vaidyanathan said that the business model is highly scalable and efficient and the recent investment from him will enable to scale business in multiple locations. He is also from IIT Madras and a MBA for IIM Calcutta besides being a qualified Cost Accountant and a Company Secretary. With 4 decades of experience in Telecom, Retail, Financial Services he brings in tremendous start up experience having worked in about 6 such projects two of which he promoted. The MFI he was heading until recently was built from scratch to a 1400 branch PAN India INR 7,000 crore AUM company. He had an Investment Banking company in the nineties.

About One Hour Bazaar

1Hour Grocery is an online supermarket for daily essentials and groceries. We have a good collection of products from most popular brands and you can choose from them. You can place an order at any time and it would be delivered to your doorstep within 60 minutes. We are operative in Chennai currently and would be expanding to other cities soon. You can pay for your orders through Paytm wallet, debit / credit card, net banking and cash on deliver.

Chennai Based Health Sensei Emerges Winner at Stanford Seed Spark Competition

Business Wire India
Health Sensei, a Chennai based healthcare start-up involved in hospital digitization, has won the Spark Cash Prize competition for business model and pitch presentation on its 24x7 live Hospital inpatient monitoring solution. Health Sensei was nominated by TiE Chennai for participation in the program, extremely happy that they emerged as a chosen winner from a pool of 86 high potential early-stage start-ups from top incubators and angel networks across the country, said Mrs. Akhila Rajeshwar, Executive Director, TiE Chennai.
 
Health Sensei recently launched a smartphone app based 24x7 live patient monitoring system for Hospital critical care units and wards. The system has been implemented in 15 Hospitals in cities including Chennai, Vellore and Hyderabad. Continuous monitoring of patients in an ICU is difficult and resource intensive. With Health Sensei, clinical teams have access to complete patient data including all waveforms and vitals to identify at-risk patients earlier and respond to critical events with conviction. During the COVID pandemic, many hospitals have found this especially useful, said Dr. Alexander Thomas, President, AHPI. Health Sensei’s continuous monitoring system helps intensive care doctors and primary consultants with early decision and intervention capacity. This can improve quality of patient monitoring and drive superior clinical outcomes. It integrates with existing patient monitors – no need to invest or upgrade to expensive new equipment, said Dr. Vijay Agarwal, President, CAHO.
 
Health Sensei’s implementation in our ICU has brought accuracy, reliability and authenticity in vitals monitoring and trend analysis providing flexibility for supervised care by our doctors even outside the hospital premises said Dr. Babu Narayanan, Consultant Physician, Consultant Intensivist, Unit Medical Director, Mehta Multispeciality Hospitals. This platform has substantially reduced resource intensive manual data capture by nurses giving them quality time for personalized patient care. In the backdrop of COVID-19 pandemic, the system has ensured safety and enhanced security for our doctors and nurses from transmissible respiratory infections, added Dr. Babu Narayanan.
 
Stanford Seed is an initiative of the Stanford Graduate School of Business to partner with entrepreneurs in emerging markets to build thriving enterprises that transform lives. Spark is Stanford Seed’s online entrepreneurship program for early stage startups to build their strategy, grow their network and ultimately boost their business acumen by providing targeted feedback to aspiring entrepreneurs. The problem that Health Sensei has identified and is working to solve is crucial to healthcare systems across the world. We are happy to see that Health Sensei team have made good use of the Stanford Seed Spark program. We wish them the best to achieve scale and impact lives, said PR Ganapathy, Regional Director, Stanford Seed - South Asia.
 
Extremely happy to have connected with fellow entrepreneurs, improve our customer offerings, and to finish as a chosen winner, added Mr. Sabarish, Chief Product Officer, Health Sensei. With the shortage of Intensivists and Nurses, Health Sensei can make a real positive difference in customer lives bringing cutting edge automation and IoT to save patient lives, provide support to over-worked clinicians and help cut hospital costs - this is a winner for patients, families, insurance companies and hospital administrators, said Mrs. Padma Chandrasekaran and Mr. Sameer Mehta, Anchor Investors in Health Sensei.

Please visit: https://healthsensei.co.in/

Saas Startup Everstage Raises $1.7 Mn Seed Funding Led By 3one4 Capital

(L) Vivek Suriyamoorthy, Co-founder and CTO (R) Siva Rajamani,Co-founder and CEO

• Prominent angels like Prasanna Sankar, co-founder of Rippling; Krish Subramanian and Rajaraman Santhanam, co-founders of Chargebee; Sidharth Malik, CRO of Freshworks; Koti Reddy, CTO of Conga; Vetri Vellore, CEO of Ally.io; Utsav Somani, Partner at Angellist India; Ganesh Shankar, CEO of Rfpio also participated in the round
• Funds raised to be used for team expansion and B2B focused marketing initiatives
• Everstage automates the sales commission processes in companies to drive the performance of their customer executives
• Everstage customers include SaaS Unicorns like Chargebee, Postman and Lambdatest

Chennai, 12th August 2021: Everstage, a B2B Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) startup has raised $1.7 million in seed funding led by 3one4 Capital with participation from several prominent angels including Prasanna Sankar, co-founder of Rippling; Krish Subramanian and Rajaraman Santhanam, co-founders of Chargebee; Sidharth Malik, CRO of Freshworks; Koti Reddy, CTO of Conga; Vetri Vellore, CEO of Ally.io; Utsav Somani, Partner at Angellist India; Ganesh Shankar, CEO of Rfpio among others. The Company plans to use

Founded in 2020, by Siva Rajamani formerly with Freshworks and Vivek Suriyamoorthy previously with DE Shaw, Everstage helps companies drive performance of their customer-facing teams through its no-code sales commission automation platform. Some of the early customers include SaaS unicorns and high-performing companies such as Chargebee, Postman & Lambdatest. Over the next 12 months, the Company plans to grow their customer base by 20X. Everstage is already working with multiple customers from the US. The Company is planning to launch their operations at a much larger scale in the US in the next 12 months.

Mr. Siva Rajamani saw this problem first-hand as the Global Head of Revenue Operations at Freshworks: sales commission management complicates work for ops & finance teams, and lack of transparency leads to stressed sales teams.

Siva Rajamani, Co-founder CEO, Everstage, says, “A typical company spends more than 10% of their budget on commissions. Yet, most companies manage commissions over spreadsheets, losing out on the opportunity to provide visibility and drive sales performance through interventions.” Legacy vendors have also not addressed this problem effectively. “In my previous role, while evaluating these vendors, we realized that they were really professional services firms disguised as software products. There was neither flexibility for the Ops and Finance team, nor were they set up to motivate sales teams,'' he adds.

Everstage was born to address this gap as they have built a platform which fully integrates quota and commissions management platform, with a no-code plan designer offering complete flexibility to Ops and Finance teams while gamifying the entire commission’s experience for customer-facing teams.

Anurag Ramdasan, Principal & Head of Investments, 3one4 Capital says, “As customer acquisition and retention have increased in complexity with more roles & workflows than ever, Revops teams have become mandatory to drive revenue. With their considerable experience, the Everstage team is well-positioned to help Revops teams succeed, starting with real-time commission planning and administration, and we're excited to partner with them."

Everstage is a B2B SaaS startup based in Delaware, US, and Chennai, India. The company provides a no-code commissions automation platform to companies across verticals. Most of its customers are organizations based in North America.

Customers use Everstage to remove recurring busywork for their Ops and Finance teams and provide transparent and gamified incentives experience to their customer-facing teams. Everstage counts hyper-growth companies such as Chargebee, Postman and Lambdatest among its customer base.

The company was founded in 2020, by Siva Rajamani (previously Freshworks) and Vivek Suriyamoorthy (previously DE Shaw). Everstage has raised $1.7M in its seed funding led by 3one4 Capital with the participation of several prominent angels. The company has aggressive growth plans with the aim to 30x its customer base and 4x its employees over the next 12 months.

About 3one4 Capital

3one4 Capital is an early-stage VC fund based in Bangalore, India. The firm works in select market categories and in the intersection of adjacencies that are large, growing, and ready for unique products and services. The themes pursued are SaaS and Enterprise Automation, Direct-to-Consumer, Media & Content, FinTech, and Deep Technology, with a focus on sectors that include machine-driven actionable intelligence services for the enterprise, ambient intelligence technologies, edtech, logistics and distribution, agri-tech, consumer products and services, and health.

3one4 Capital currently oversees a corpus of INR 1800 Cr (+$240 Mn) and a portfolio of 70+ total investments across the early stage. Its portfolio companies include Licious, Bank Open, DarwinBox, Betterplace, Koo, Dozee, Breathe Well-Being, among others. The firm, founded by Pranav Pai & Siddarth Pai, has continuously attracted top-tier global and Indian investors as Limited Partners (LPs). These investors include family offices, endowments, foundations, as well as corporate and financial institutional investors.

ISRO Engineers Founded Automation Startup Fabheads Raises Rs.8 Crore Funding Led by Inflection Point Ventures

• Fabheads is a well-recognised startup in the hardware and manufacturing segment in India.
• Funds raised to be utilised in strengthening R&D team, building global sales and distribution and setting up infrastructure to support growth.
• Fabheads had earlier raised Rs. 4 crores in 2018.
• IPV announces Fabheads as its 15th deal for 2021; likely to invest Rs. 155 crore this year across 60 plus startups.

Fabheads Founders

19th May 2021, Delhi: Fabheads, a Chennai-based startup focused on automated manufacturing in the carbon fiber (and other composites) space, has raised Rs 8 crore in a Pre-Series A round led by Inflection Point Ventures, one of India’s largest angel investment platforms in India. Existing investors Keiretsu (Chennai Chapter) and Mr. Vijay Kedia also participated. The funds raised will be utilized in strengthening R&D team, build global sales and distribution and setting up infrastructure to support growth.

Ankur Mittal, Co-Founder, Inflection Point Venture says, 

Fabheads is a deep-tech startup which has built proprietary technology that can compete with the best in the world in a space dominated by only few large well-funded startups / publicly listed companies and where the use cases have the potential to grow exponentially in the near future. With the founders’ background from ISRO, we believe their expertise in robotics and 3D technology will help the company grow faster. Our network and the funds raised will help them achieve their ambition to scale across the world.

Fabheads developed India’s first 3D printer capable of printing with continuous fiber materials. It is also the winner of the National Award for Technology Startups (2021) by the Department of Science and Technology, National Startup Awards (2020) in the 3D Printing Category by Startup India, DRDO’s DaretoDream Award (2019), JEC’s Outstanding Innovation in composites award (2018) and the Top Startup in Manufacturing (2018) by CII.

Fabheads' Continuous Fiber 3D Printer Series [Image - fabheads.in/technology]

 
Currently, the startup is offering design and manufacturing services to drones, robotics, and shipping companies across India. A few of its portfolio companies are E-plane Company, Synergy Marine, Planys and ADA (Aeronautical Development Agency). It has also onboarded a couple of Singapore clients and recently started pilot operations across Asia.

Dhinesh Kanagaraj, Founder & CEO, Fabheads and ex-ISRO engineer says, 

IPV is one of the few investors who see the value in deep tech hardware startups. IPV team took great efforts towards understanding our offerings and have also gone beyond that by already adding value to Fabheads by making extremely relevant connections via their large business network across India and the Middle East.

The biggest value addition made by Fabheads to their clients is offering the flexibility to use their in-house certified raw materials. This factor is of extreme importance in the biomedical and aerospace industries as the clients go through decades of research to certify their materials.

Fabheads serves a large carbon fiber parts market which is a global market of $60 Billion with an annual CAGR of 14%. The Indian market alone is $5 Billion. Carbon fibers are used to make several high-performance parts from tennis racquets to rockets having applications across Sports, Automotive, Wind Energy Sector, Shipping, Aerospace, etc. and Fabheads plans to slowly expand into more sectors and geographies down the line.

About Fabheads

Fabheads was founded in 2015 by a group of experienced ISRO engineers with rich experience in product and large project management and pivoted in to composite material 3-D printing business model in 2017. The startup has since successfully raised two rounds of funding and is one of the well-recognised startups in the deep-tech hardware space in India. The company is the most known for being the first and still the only company in India to have developed their patented continuous fiber 3D printing process, a feat only a handful of companies across the world have achieved.

About Inflection Point Ventures

Inflection Point Ventures is a 3500+ strong members angel investing firm that supports new-age entrepreneurs, providing them monetary & experiential capital by connecting them with a diverse group of investors. Believing that ‘Everyone can Grow with Startups’, IPV was started in 2018 and plans to invest INR 155 cr in 2021 across 60 startups. IPV’s investors’ base is seeing a massive influx of highly accomplished CXOs and HNIs, looking to invest in startups with rational valuation and sustainable business models.

Vajro, A Chennai-based Start-up is Leading Innovation in the Global Live Video Commerce Space

Live Video commerce is the latest trend that's taking over the entire eCommerce world, with the medium garnering attention from major brands and audiences alike. With the pandemic derailing brick and mortar stores, people have turned to more interactive and engaging online purchasing experiences. Combining the elements of live streaming and eCommerce, sellers can present their product through the stream, answer questions in real time, and encourage viewers to buy products.

Vajro - Global Live Video Commerce Space

Launched in 2018, Vajro is a no-code, mobile app builder currently operating in the Shopify ecosystem. Currently catering to over 1500 Shopify stores, Vajro is the leading Mobile App Builder for ecommerce stores and has simplified social selling for the US market. They are the first Mobile App Builder in the world to support in-app live selling - meaning store owners can use their native mobile app to do a live sale. Vajro supports selling on Facebook as well.

"We have evolved significantly since we launched Blynk, our Live Video Commerce feature, in Nov 2019. We originally launched Blynk as a live feature from within the app and provided buyers the opportunity to add the displayed products to their carts at the click of a button. Now we offer the ability for our clients to go live on their app and parallel stream that on Facebook. We have also automated reading comments from Facebook and auto-invoicing buyers based on the comments. We have hundreds of clients using our Live Video feature," said Baskar Agneeswaran, CEO of Vajro.

Anyone watching the live sale can purchase the products without leaving the platform-be it Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, or even native apps. If you're thinking this sounds similar to those late night infomercials, you're quite right. The viewers get a glimpse of how the products look and how they work, as if they are shopping from a physical store, two aspects that make shopping an enjoyable experience, both of which were lacking previously in online shopping.

80% of the top Facebook posts were live videos and they drive at least 59% more engagement. It is the number one form demanded by people from their favorite brands and the numbers show no signs of slowing down. The US video streaming market is believed to be about $59 billion in 2021. Combined with the AR/VR in shopping, live selling has the potential to result in limitless possibilities.

Even before the pandemic, live video commerce was a rage in China. It was so popular among Chinese shoppers that it accounted for 16% of all online sales. And, the number shows no signs of slowing down. Today, the total sales from live streams stand up to a colossal 200 billion USD, with up to 80% attributed to Alibaba's Taobao live. The trend was soon picked up by Korea. The US was late to the party and in 2019, Amazon started Amazon Live. Today, it's one of the prominent selling strategies used by eCommerce giants and small brands alike.

"How we consume video content has evolved at a phenomenal rate and it has a decisive impact in our buying choices. Live selling makes it so easy for shoppers to buy. Watch your sale, click on the buy button (or comment during the live session). As simple as that," Baskar quoted.

But, convenience and ease are not the only reasons why live sales are such a big hit among shoppers. People are looking to make authentic interactions and meaningful connections with the brands they love and follow. The "live sale" facilitates real-time conversations and so produces unique content every single time. It's a cost-effective medium to sell products, ideal for fashion boutiques and cosmetic brands, but certainly not limited to them. It also taps into the shoppers' FOMO with its element of immediacy. It takes the "limited time only" to the next level. Imagine you see the limited quantity available; others are commenting they want to purchase the product. The clock is ticking as the host moves on to display the next item. Fueled by this urgency, "anticipated regret" kicks in and their brain goes from view-only mode to I-want-this-now mode. The live sale accelerates the purchasing decision, with emotions driving it rather than rationale.

"Unlike other trends that fizzle away after a few glorious months, live video commerce is here for the long haul. It has proven itself as an explosive sales channel in China and now in the US. It's all up for taking in India. It presents a huge opportunity for Indian eCommerce businesses to scale rapidly and keep their followers engaged," concludes Baskar.

Chennai-based AhaGuru Raises Funding Led by Anand Mahindra's Family Office

AhaGuru Founders Gomathi Shanmugasudaram and Balaji Sampath

AhaGuru, a pioneer in online learning, has raised an undisclosed amount of funding in a Series A round led by an investment firm managed by Mr. Anand Mahindra's family office. The funds will be used to develop new technology features and online courses for high school students and increase its student base across the country as well as in the Middle East. The funds will also help the company expand its team of expert teachers and mentors. 

AhaGuru was founded by Dr. Balaji Sampath and Ms. Gomathi Shanmugasundaram to research and develop solutions to the learning quality problem. AhaGuru’s research into learning gaps has helped it develop unique techniques to greatly improve concept understanding and problem-solving abilities of students. These special techniques in turn leads to AhaGuru students excelling both in competitive exams and school boards. For example, AhaGuru student, Muhender Raj, secured All India Rank 4 in IIT JEE (Advanced) and 100% (percentile) in JEE (Mains) that were conducted last month. Another AhaGuru student, Jay Murekar, ranked TN State First in JEE. Even more impressive than their long list of toppers is the overall performance of AhaGuru students. And while the coaching industry average is less than 20% students clearing JEE, over 75% of AhaGuru students cleared JEE and over 95% cleared NEET in 2020.

This focus on learning quality has helped AhaGuru grow organically in Chennai, Bangalore, Pune, Hyderabad and Kolkata and the investment from Mr. Anand Mahindra’s family office will help it scale to many more students across more geographies.

Mr. Anand Mahindra says, “AhaGuru stands for making learning easier and understandable by deploying well researched techniques. Their sharp focus on enhancing the quality of teaching Science and Math can help students grasp fundamentals more effectively. I am hopeful that AhaGuru will help Indian students build curiosity and a scientific temper.”

“This funding enables us to launch new courses to help students with their school and board exams. We are also working on several new technology features to make the student learning experience richer. We are investing in Artificial Intelligence to personalize the learning experience for each student. Our predictive learning model, identifies student learning patterns and suggests enhancements that improves success rate of students,” says Dr. Balaji Sampath.

AhaGuru’s Live Online Classes and Recorded Video Courses has been a boon to students preparing for JEE and NEET. These comprehensive courses not only provide clearly presented lectures, but also have lots of video examples that demonstrate how to apply concepts to different problem-situations. Each lesson also includes a large number of practice questions with detailed solutions. The well-researched methodology helps students not only understand concepts deeply but also helps them easily master problem-solving. Students say that AhaGuru's courses not only builds their concepts and skills, but also gives them a huge confidence booster.

AhaGuru's online coaching which has been growing steadily over the last few years, has seen a big surge during the Covid pandemic. “The number of students enrolling for both our live online classes as well as our recorded video courses has tripled. Our teams are working overtime to ensure every student is learning well. This investment will help us get more teachers and provide personalized learning support to our students,” says Ms. Gomathi.

Unlike many other players in the EdTech space, AhaGuru does not want to dilute its focus by expanding to lots of different subjects and exams. “We focus exclusively on Science and Math education for middle and high school students. Our team is constantly researching and developing better and better ways to help students master these subjects. Our courses are quite intensive and meant for serious students willing to spend 6 to 8 hours per week for each subject,” says Dr. Sampath. It is this focus on subject mastery that sets AhaGuru apart as a premium player in the EdTech space attracting serious students who want a deep understanding of Physics, Chemistry, Maths and Biology.

Kreator 3D Develops An Indigenous Ventilator In Collaboration with SRM IST & Rizel Automotives

Kreator 3D, a Chennai based start-up primarily into manufacturing of 3D printers, has collaborated with SRM Institute of Science and Technology and Rizel Automotive Chennai to design an easy-to-manufacture and cost-effective ventilator in a short span of just 2 weeks. Final assembling and testing has been done and the device is now being submitted for necessary approvals to requisite medical bodies.

The team has decided to make their designs available as an open-source file owing to the prevalent Covid-19 situation in the country, to ensure maximum reach of the product.



In wake of the current pandemic that has struck the globe, the team at Kreator 3D wanted to use their technological know-how, skillset and put it to good use for the society.

After intense brainstorming with doctors, and realizing that ventilator splitters are not the most effective and safe devices, they decided to build a stand-alone cost effective ventilator. Collective knowledge and collaborative efforts with SRM Institute of Science and Technology (SRMIST), and Rizel Automotive helped finalize the design faster.

“Current online data suggests that only 20% of the Covid 19 patients need a ventilator. However, when the need arises, it becomes imperative to provide it to the patients in time, owing to the criticality of the situation. Current ventilators in the market cost about 10-15 lakhs and it takes a good amount of time and processes to build one. It was this gap that we decided to bridge; thus, built a fully functional ventilator that serves patients in case of emergencies”, says Shubham Dawkhar, Chief Technology Officer, Kreator 3D.

[video width="1280" height="720" mp4="http://indianweb2/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/IMG_2967.mp4"][/video]

Commenting on the collaboration with SRMIST and Rizel Automotive, Anurag Atulya, Chief Executive Officer of Kreator 3D says, “The collaborative efforts of all three entities has helped in creating a product that we think will help in easing at least one battle against Covid-19. Our focus was not just on creating a product, but to build a cost effective and functional machine that reaches people in time. In such a grave crisis, it’s important that there is effective use and transfer of technological knowledge for the betterment of the society. Therefore, in order to reach out to more manufacturers in the country, we decided to make our design public, so a greater number of companies/people can help build and provide these ventilators to hospitals.”

The SRM Innovation and Design Centre oversees the innovation activities in the institute through its Incubation center and provides the FABLAB, a one-stop shop equipped with all necessary equipment and tools to its students.

Dr Shantanu Patil, Head, SRM Innovation and Design Centre(SIIC) and HoD, Translational Medicine, SRM Medical College while commenting on the collaboration says, “We are happy to collaborate with Kreator 3D and Rizel Automotive to get this product to reach its final stages and will extend all possible support and help that’s needed for the product to reach its final goal”.

The team at Kreator 3D are also printing and supplying 3D printed face shields to SRM Hospital, civil servants and workers around the city.

About Kreator 3D:

Kreator 3D is a 3D printer manufacturing start-up based out of Chennai incubated in SRM Institute of Science and Technology. It was founded by Anurag Atulya and Shubham Dawkhar. Their machines are comparable to the global standards in terms of finesse and quality of printing. They will be launching their 3D printers for the Indian market in the coming months.

About Rizel Automotive:

A technology start-up working on solving critical challenges associated of Electric vehicles. They work on the research and development of cost-effective electric motors with performance, Battery Packs & BMS for Electric Vehicles.