Tag: #news

• With a strong focus on transforming last-mile logistics and promoting sustainable transport, this partnership marks the most significant EV deployment to date.
• The initiative is expected to create over 10,000 green jobs, saving approximately 25,000 tonnes of CO₂ emissions annually, delivering both environmental and socio-economic impact.

BizDateUp, amongst the largest ecosystem enablers for startups that provide comprehensive end-to-end services, facilitates an INR 100 crore partnership between BattRE Electric Mobility, EV91, and evpe. The strategic alliance will see the deployment of 10,000 electric two-wheelers across India, beginning in Q2 2025, with a strong focus on transforming last-mile logistics and promoting sustainable transport.

This landmark collaboration comes as a pivotal time when India is witnessing remarkable growth in EV adoption. According to the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways’ Vahan portal, EV sales in CY24 touched 1.95 million units, up from 1.53 million in 2023. Electric two-wheelers alone accounted for 1.15 million units, representing a 33% year-on-year growth. The surge has been driven by an improved consumer sentiment, policy incentives, and deeper market penetration by two-wheeler manufacturers, especially in Tier II and Tier III cities.

Under the leadership of Jeet Chandan, Founder and Director of BizDateUp, played the catalyst in aligning all stakeholders, structuring the deal, and closing one of the most significant EV deployment partnerships to date.

As part of the agreement, BattRE Electric Mobility will supply high-performance electric two-wheelers tailored for logistics needs. EV91, a fast-growing logistics fleet aggregator, will deploy these vehicles across urban and semi-urban locations to build an energy-efficient delivery network. Meanwhile, evpe, an integrated EV financing company, will enable financially viable ownership and fleet acquisition models for drivers and businesses alike.

“This isn’t just a deal but a statement,” said Jeet Chandan, Founder and Director, BizDateUp. “At BizDateUp, we’re building powerful collaborations that spark real change. Bringing together BattRE, EV91, and evpe is a perfect example of how we connect vision, capital, and execution to create lasting impact in sectors that matter like clean mobility.”

“This ₹100 crore order is a strong validation of our work at BattRE,” said Pankaj Sharma, Co-Founder of BattRE Electric Mobility. “With rising demand and EV-friendly sentiment spreading across smaller towns, this rollout allows us to serve the exact segment that’s driving India’s clean mobility revolution.”

Arun Kumar, Founder & CEO of EV91, added, “We’re seeing firsthand how logistics is evolving. EV adoption isn’t just a cost decision, it’s now a sustainability imperative. With BizDateUp’s guidance and the strength of our partners, we’re committed to redefining what eco-conscious, efficient logistics looks like across India.”

Rohan Yeggina, Co-Founder & CEO of evpe said, “One of the biggest roadblocks to EV adoption is financing. By working closely with BattRE and EV91, we’ve created a model that makes large-scale EV deployment both accessible and scalable particularly in emerging markets and Tier II cities.”

The initiative is expected to create over 10,000 green jobs and save approximately 25,000 tonnes of CO₂ emissions annually, delivering both environmental and socio-economic impact.”

About Bizdateup Technologies

Founded by Jeet Chandan and Co-founded by Meet Jain, BizDateUp is amongst the largest ecosystem enablers for startups offering comprehensive support services that propel groundbreaking ideas and visionary entrepreneurs to the forefront of their industry. With a steadfast commitment to nurturing a culture of innovation, BizDateUp empowers startups to challenge conventions, pioneer new solutions, and drive meaningful change in their respective fields.

In the fiscal year of 2023-24, BizDateUp showcased remarkable growth and impact. The organization solidified its position within the ecosystem by successfully funding over 25 startups, raising a $10 million fund, and engaging with more than 1000 active angel investors.

Notably, BizDateUp achieved an impressive average return of 3.5X, demonstrating its ability to identify and support high-growth ventures. Through strategic investments, mentorship, and networking opportunities, BizDateUp continues to fuel the growth and success of the startup and investor community, fostering a vibrant ecosystem.

The Future of Electric Vehicles In India

The electric vehicles market is seeing growth spurge in recent years. Find out what will the future of electric vehicles look like in India.

StartupTalkyHimangi Khare

The Young Entrepreneurs Fund (YEF), a $10 million initiative, was launched today by Harshavardhan Chauhaan, the veteran marketing strategist behind billion-dollar retail and D2C ventures. Fueled entirely by proceeds from Chauhaan’s incendiary new book, #NCAYB (Nobody Cares About Your Brand), this radical fusion of literary provocation and venture capital targets early-stage founders driving innovation in Deep Tech, Clean Energy, Rural Platforms, and National IP. Chauhaan, whose career spans scaling hypergrowth startups and redefining brand psychology, positions YEF as both a critique of outdated marketing dogma and a capital engine for those rewriting India’s economic future, aligned with the vision of Viksit Bharat, Karmyogi Bharat, and Vishwa Vyapi Bharat.

The fund’s structure defies conventional venture models, mirroring Harshvardhan Chauhaan’s unorthodox approach to consumer influence. Unlike traditional investors fixated on pitch decks and financial projections, YEF allocates $10,000-$250,000 grants to raw, pre-revenue ideas, prioritizing societal impact and scalable solutions over spreadsheets. This ethos stems directly from #NCAYB’s core thesis, that consumer trust, not product-centric frameworks like the 1960s-era 4Ps of Marketing, now dictates market success. Proceeds from every copy of #NCAYB sold directly go to the YEF, creating a self-sustaining loop between thought leadership and founder empowerment.

Commenting on the fund launch, Harshvardhan Chauhaan said, “The true revolution in business won’t happen in boardrooms where executives cling to century-old theories. It will emerge from garages and Discord servers where founders understand that consumers don’t follow brands, they follow trust architectures. Through the launch of the Young Entrepreneurs Fund, our aim is to go beyond funding business plans by investing in neural networks of influence that rewrite consumer behavior from the subconscious up. When the history of 21st century commerce is written, it won’t mention advertisements or product features; it will document how trust became the only currency that mattered.”

Beyond financial backing, YEF provides grantees with mentorship from global brand strategists, growth marketers, and serial entrepreneurs who understand the evolving dynamics of consumer trust and fractional loyalty. Ashish Soni, an alumnus of IIT Bombay, serial entrepreneur, and industry leader in AI and emerging technologies, has joined YEF as a pro bono mentor and board advisor. With over 14 years of experience across innovation, product development, and tech consulting, Ashish will help guide the fund’s direction, ensuring high-impact value creation and strategic excellence.

The fund’s mandate spans four strategic sectors critical to India’s transformation. In Deep Tech, YEF will support startups pioneering breakthroughs in artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and advanced robotics, technologies poised to redefine global technological frontiers. Clean Energy innovators will receive backing for solutions in renewable energy generation, green infrastructure, and carbon-neutral technologies, aligning with India’s sustainability goals. Rural Platforms form another key focus area for YEF, aiding ventures that democratize access to agritech tools, rural fintech ecosystems, and digital literacy programs to bridge the urban- rural divide – a direct contribution to the Viksit Bharat ideal. 

Apart from these, YEF will also help National IP initiatives gain traction by scaling indigenous innovations, from traditional crafts to climate-resilient agricultural practices, ensuring these ideas achieve global resonance under the Vishwa Vyapi Bharat framework. These verticals align with #NCAYB’s principles of the Trust Algorithm, Fractional Loyalty, and the Influence Flywheel while anchoring YEF’s role in fostering a Karmyogi Bharat where skill development and entrepreneurial grit converge. By channeling resources into these domains, the fund aims to cultivate a self-reliant economy where trust-based consumer relationships and homegrown innovations drive progress.

Applications for YEF open April 14, 2025, exclusively at NobodyCaresForYourBrand.com

Roles, Functions, and Primary Purpose of Business Incubators

Explore the role of a business incubator in a startup and how it can help entrepreneurs turn their innovative ideas into successful businesses.

StartupTalkyAvantika Bhardwaj

• Calligo Technologies develops products and solutions for the growing HPC, AI, and Big Data computing workloads
• Funds raised to be used for R&D expenses for Ver2.0 of silicon chip
• The company has achieved a breakthrough by successfully designing the POSIT-based ver1.0 semiconductor chip
• The company plans to expand its engineering talent and tech capabilities to build ver2.0 of the Silicon chip and establish partnerships
• CalligoTech is an early recipient of the Design Linked Incentive (PDLI) grant from MEITY.

Calligo Technologies, a pioneering semiconductor startup, has raised $1.1 million in a pre-series A round led by Seafund and Artha Venture Fund. 

CalligoTech’s products are focussed at Accelerating High Performance Computing (HPC) and AI` workloads with its innovative implementation of POSIT in silicon.

The funds raised will be used for R&D expenses for developing the ver2.0 Silicon chip and platform. In addition to the previous breakthrough with the POSIT-based ver1.0 silicon semiconductor chip, the company is also planning to further increase its engineering talent and tech capabilities to build ver2.0 Semiconductor products and establish partnerships with System-Integrators and OEMs/ODMs.

Founded by Anantha Kinnal, Rajaraman Subramanian, and Vinay N Hebbali, Calligo Technologies is focused on developing products and solutions for HPC, Big Data, and AI workloads. The company aims to solve the performance bottlenecks of computing needed for large-scale modeling and simulations in HPC systems and large-model training and inference needed in AI systems, a critical need in a market with large computational needs.

In the last 12 months, CalligoTech has collaborated with US universities, national laboratories, and supercomputing centers to improve access to tech talent and soft launch its operations in the US.

The company has also built an accelerator board, received First Pass Silicon Ver1.0, and started shipping to customers.

Commenting on the investment, Narendra Bhandari, General Partner, Seafund, says, “Compute requirement is growing exponentially across the globe. CalligoTech chips and platform improves performance and reduces data power consumption with their innovative approach. They have completed the full chip cycle from design to products in v1.0 and are accelerating to tapeout the nextgen silicon.”

Anantha Kinnal, Co-founder and CEO of CalligoTech adds, “Insatiable demand for computing for HPC/AI has thus far been addressed by adding more and more Hardware, without addressing computing efficiency at grass-root levels. POSIT is a game-changing invention for real-number representation, as it tackles this issue by enabling the use of fewer computing bits for the same or improved mathematical accuracy, higher energy efficiency, and an increase in dynamic range. Combining Posits with RISC-V, our current version of Silicon TUNGA – an Octacore RISC-V CPU – powers our accelerator card that can be added to any X86/ARM/PowerPC-based Servers. This is already enabling researchers worldwide to realize the usefulness of  Posit-based computing.”  

Speaking on the investment, Anirudh A Damani, Managing Partner of Artha Venture Fund, says, “With AI and HPC workloads growing exponentially, computing efficiency is more critical than ever. Calligo’s POSIT-based chips solve fundamental performance bottlenecks, enabling faster, more precise, and power-efficient computing at scale. As demand for large-scale modeling and AI training surges, we see POSIT as a game-changing innovation poised to become a new standard in computing.”

CalligoTech has modified RISC-V C/C++/gFortran/Python compilers, frameworks, and libraries to support Posits and generate Posit-enabled executables natively. Importantly, CalligoTech’s approach requires no source-level modifications to run HPC/AI applications.

“We are very excited to receive new investments from Seafund and Artha to build ver2.0 of our Silicon—a 64-core Posit-enabled RISC-V System-on-Chip for large-scale deployment for HPC/AI computing, “ Anantha added. 

In the next 12-18 months, the company plans to capture the market by allowing customers to experience its current product and tape out its System-on-Chip (ver2.0 of Silicon) for high-volume manufacturing.

According to Custom Market Insights, India’s Semiconductor Market was valued at USD 6.67 Billion in 2024 and is expected to reach USD 14.09 Billion by 2032, at a CAGR of 10.1% during the forecast period 2024 – 2032. CalligoTech is well-positioned to become a global leader with a substantial market to build.

About Calligo Technologies

Calligo Technologies is a Bangalore-INDIA-based start-up focused on developing products and solutions serving HPC, Big Data, and AI/ML segments to global marquee enterprises. The leadership team comes with a collective experience of more than 100+ years with wide exposure to Semiconductor designs, Systems, Storage, and Software. CalligoTech is focused on solving performance bottlenecks of computing needed for large-scale modeling and simulations in HPC systems and large-model training & inference needed in AI systems.

CalligoTech believes that Posit is a game-changing, disruptive invention at grass-root levels that can create new Standards for computing. About 30B computing devices today are expected to explode to 50B by 2028, primarily due to new mobile, automotive, embedded, and IoT segments. Posit-based computing has enormous potential as it forms the fundamental building block across key verticals, such as Data Analytics, Cognitive Computing through Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning, Security, Robotics, Computer Vision, Finance, Autonomous Vehicles, Advanced Driver Assistance Systems, etc.

About Artha Venture Fund:

Artha Venture Fund is India’s first early-stage microVC fund, backed by Artha India Ventures. Artha Venture Fund-I has invested in marquee companies like Agnikul, Everest Fleet, Daalchini, GetWork, and InstaAstro, among 32 others, that formed part of Fund I. This investment is warehoused for Artha Venture Fund II, which will be announced shortly.  

About Seafund 

Seafund is a Category 2 Alternate Investment Fund (AIF) early-stage focused technology fund with Deeptech as a core focus. The fund provides Capital to mission-driven teams building Technologies of Tomorrow and brings its Commitment, Network, and Experience to each of their investments. Seafund has invested in Spacetech, EV Infra, AI powered Saas, Robotics backing passionate growth oriented founders.

Seafund is run by a founding team comprising Manoj Kumar Agarwal, Mayuresh Raut, and Narendra Bhandari as General Partners. They bring rich experience in investing, building and selling technological products, Global GTM and a rich network of domain experts and business leaders. This core team has lived and breathed building businesses across multiple B2B environments.

Top 15 Biggest Semiconductor Companies in the World

Through this article, we present the top 15 biggest semiconductor companies in the world that provide the best facilities and advanced features to meet the increasing demand for semiconductors.

StartupTalkyPratyusha Srivastava

The services sector in India experienced a slight moderation in March, as the HSBC Services PMI slid to 58.5 from 59.0 in February. Despite this minor downturn, the index remained comfortably above the 50-mark that delineates growth from shrinkage, indicating that the sector continues to swell, though at a less robust rate than in some recent months. The final figure also bested the not overly ambitious preliminary estimate of 57.7, reflecting a degree of underlying strength in demand.

New business volumes, especially from domestic markets, continued to expand in March but at a reduced pace compared to February. Demand from international markets is the real weak spot in all of this, with new orders from abroad barely showing any growth at all, orders rising at the slowest rate in more than a year. If looking for signs of a softening economy, these would be in the top three. And they are.

Easing Price Pressures and Weaker Sentiment

Companies indicated that input costs rose at the slowest pace seen in five months, and, with vigorous competition in the marketplace, this has meant that any increase in prices that firms were able to charge has been minimal. In fact, the increase in selling prices was the smallest that has been seen since September 2021. This is not a good development for the bottom line.

This environment of softer demand and fierce market competition led to diminished business confidence. The future activity index slipped to a seven-month low, suggesting that a number of firms are taking a more conservative approach to the next 12 months. Hiring was almost nonexistent in March, with the services sector and the manufacturing sector together providing the fewest new jobs in nearly a year.

Rate Cut Expectations Grow

Even with the slowdown, the overall private sector was still going strong. The HSBC India Composite PMI, which encompasses both services and manufacturing data, rose to 59.5 in March, the highest it had been in seven months, and it was once again driven by a robust performance from the manufacturing sector.

As inflation recedes and confidence falls, the Reserve Bank of India might think about making policy easier to back up economic momentum. The markets think a potential 25 basis point rate cut could happen at the next RBI policy meeting, set for April 9, particularly since the economy as a whole looks to have grown at its slowest pace in four years over the last fiscal year.

Even though growth continues, intensifying rivalry, hesitant recruitment, and worldwide apprehension imply a somewhat slower route for India’s service sector over the approaching months. This is particularly true for business process outsourcing (BPO) firms, which cater mostly to clients in the United States and the United Kingdom.