Breaking startup & business news from India.
Navi Limited today announced an investment of USD 100 million from Prosus, marking Navi's first institutional capital raise and an important milestone in its journey to build one of India's leading technology-driven financial services institutions. The proposed investment aligns with Prosus's long standing thesis
Escorts to set up new manufacturing plant in Uttar Pradesh’s YEIDA industrial region with investment of over INR 2,000 crore The 154-acre complex will manufacture tractors, agricultural equipment, construction gear and engines for domestic and global markets.
Seven funding rounds closed on 19 August 2026, spanning data centres, paediatric healthtech, deep tech, speciality coffee, enterprise AI and construction procurement. Piper Serica, Inflexor Ventures and DG Daiwa Ventures were among the day's lead investors. The headline raise is CtrlS's INR 250 crore round, which
Gujarat has permitted 12-hour work shifts at Micron’s semiconductor plant in Sanand, but statutory limit of 48 hours work per week will continue to apply. The measure comes with a view to assist semiconductor manufacturing and attract strategic investments to Gujarat.
KKR signs definitive deal to buy minority share in BookMyShow, supporting Indian entertainment platform’s next stage of expansion. The investment would assist BookMyShow in expanding its live entertainment business and enhancing its full-stack solutions across India.
📚 Learning
Learn how to sell coupons online, choose the right platform, source valid deals, attract customers, and build a profitable coupon-selling business with low investment.
Funding marks Japanese VC firm DGDV’s maiden investment in India’s specialty coffee market First Coffee has expanded to 25 stores since its last funding back in 2024, and plans to expand beyond urban markets with the funding With this latest round, First Coffee has raised $2.5 million to date.
The Investment will support Digidukan’s technology, product expansion, and growth across Tier-2 and Tier-3 markets.
Swiggy shareholders have given their approval to the business’s plan to become an Indian owned and controlled company (IOCC), with foreign ownership capped at 49.5%. The resolution was passed with 99.99% backing at its AGM on 18 August, a major obstacle after an earlier proposal was rejected.
The company will use the capital to build a factory-manufactured platform for decentralised sewage and effluent treatment, combining proven process technologies with modular RCC infrastructure and lifecycle service
Gold and silver rates today in India, 19 August 2026. 24K gold trades at ₹154,400 per 10g and silver at ₹230,260 per kg, with silver sliding further as Comex weakens. Check city-wise rates and MCX data below.
Inox Clean Energy completes INR 6,000-crore acquisition of Vena Energy India, a renewable energy platform supported by GIP and BlackRock. Inox Clean’s portfolio will include 2.7 GW of solar and wind projects and 1.3 GWh of battery energy storage capacity with the deal.
OpenAI is pausing some training of frontier AI amid growing cybersecurity and safety worries over more strong models. The corporation has put certain reinforcement learning for its next Astra model on hold, while tightening standards for alignment, security and monitoring.
The company has added better safety controls for its chat experience for teens, automatically applying safety limits to users aged 13-17 or accounts that are detected as a minor. The “ChatGPT for Teens” approach controls content around self-harm, violence, eating disorders, and explicit sexuality.
📰 News
Discover the best Indian jewellery brands for Raksha Bandhan gifting, from affordable fashion jewellery to elegant, personalised and premium pieces for every sister.
Four funding rounds closed on 18 August 2026, spanning geospatial tech, child healthtech, AI lending and travel. Neev II Fund, Aavishkaar Capital, Colossa Ventures and Norwest were among the day's lead investors. The headline raise is NeoGeo's $20 million Series A round. Away from funding, Uber
Atravelq, a Chandigarh-based travel company focused on personalised international travel, has secured a fresh funding round at an equity valuation of ₹10 crore, backed by its seed investors and founding stakeholders. The capital will support the company's next phase of growth through investments in technology and enhanced customer
India’s MoRTH has proposed to extend the operational life of electric, hydrogen and CNG vehicles by five years by revisions to the Central Motor Vehicles Rules, 1989. The move might help save ownership costs, boost car residuals and encourage cleaner mobility.
Google intends to move production of its Pixel smartphone, smartwatch and wireless earbuds away from China to Vietnam and India by 2027. The move is part of Google’s drive to diversify its supply chain and lessen reliance on Chinese manufacturing amid US-China trade concerns.
AI-native LendTech Platform Rezolv raises $12.5 million in a Series A round led by Norwest, with participation from Vertex Ventures Southeast Asia and India and 3one4 Capital.
Lissun raises INR 48 Crore in Series A led by Colossa Ventures along with participation from Physis Capital and RPSG Capital Ventures, to scale child development ecosystem.
Razorpay has built an AI-powered payment foundation model trained on 4 billion transactions to increase payment success, fraud detection and checkout customisation. It examines more than 3,000 transaction signals and achieved payment success rates up to 8-10% higher during early testing.
Gold and silver rates today in India, 18 August 2026. 24K gold trades at ₹155,410 per 10g and silver at ₹235,970 per kg, both falling as Comex slips on profit booking. Check city-wise rates and MCX data below.
Colgate-Palmolive India has handed over Palmolive’s D2C and e-commerce business to Bombay Shaving Company in a bid to speed up the digital expansion of the personal care brand. The agreement leverages Colgate's strengths in product, supply chain and marketing, with BSC's digital-first know-how.
ByteDance has struck an AI copyright agreement with the MPA in Hollywood to boost intellectual property safeguards for its Seedance video and Seedream image-generation models. The agreement comes after a cease-and-desist letter in Feb & complaints from Disney and other studios.
India's quick commerce business is also growing fast, with consumer demand reaching about 9.5 million daily orders, says Datum Intelligence. Blinkit has 36.7%, Zepto 26.2% and Swiggy Instamart 14.4%. Order volumes are growing for Amazon Now, BigBasket and Flipkart Minutes.
🗞️ Funding Roundup
Welcome to StartupTalky’s 2026 Indian startup funding updates. This article provides a clear and easy overview of the latest startup funding news in India throughout the year. Our weekly funding tables, updated regularly, track how much funding each startup has raised, the sectors they operate in, the key investors
The government has approved 31 projects for INR 7,877 crore under the fifth tranche of the Electronics Component Manufacturing Scheme (ECMS) supporting companies such as Kaynes Technology, Wipro, Motherson and Micromax. The projects are estimated to create manufacturing worth INR 82,243 crore.
One funding round closed on 17 August 2026, with OTP Ventures leading a pesticide-free food bet. The headline raise is DeHaat Honest Farms' INR 35 crore pre-Series A round. Away from funding, PhysicsWallah shares jumped 9.5% after brokerage upgrades, while Ola Electric expanded into battery energy storage. Parle
Gold and silver rates today in India, 17 August 2026. 24K gold trades at ₹155,630 per 10g and silver at ₹238,690 per kg, both edging higher as Comex holds firm near record levels. Check city wise rates and MCX data below.
Ola Electric has unveiled a complete energy storage portfolio for home, commercial and utility scale applications. Beside electric vehicles, the business is working on new battery energy storage devices, Ola Shakti 2, Shakti Rack and Mahashakti, to broaden the company’s energy offerings.
The Maharashtra FDA has suspended Parle Agro's licence after expired Frooti, Appy and Apple Fizz worth almost INR 99,970 were found at its Chembur warehouse. The measure is part of a wider assault on food safety in restaurants, warehouses and quick-commerce platforms across the state.
Concerns over fresh food safety have been raised after a rat was allegedly discovered inside an ice cream freezer at a Blinkit store in Thane, prompting calls for regulatory action. The incident follows inspections by the Maharashtra FDA that had identified hygienic issues at many Qcomm stores.
FSSAI said six food enterprises corrected false statements, trademarks and product labels after regulatory notices. Livyor Ventures eliminated the "vegan & healthy" term from its roasted edamame beans, and other companies changed trademarks and more.
Amber Enterprises will start commercial smartphone manufacture in India for Oppo, OnePlus and Realme from Q1 FY28 after trial production in Q4 FY27. Amber has partnered with Oppo Mobiles India and plans to manufacture roughly 8 million smartphones in the first year.
India has told public and private refineries to boost output of LPG as problems related to the Strait of Hormuz issue, thru which over 90% of the country's LPG imports pass, have hit supplies. Domestic refiners have already increased output from 36,000 tonnes a day to 54,000 tonnes a day.
🗞️ Funding Roundup
Welcome to StartupTalky’s 2026 US funding updates. This article offers a clear and structured overview of the latest investment activity in the United States throughout the year. Our weekly funding tables, updated regularly, track how much funding companies have raised, the industries they operate in, key investors involved, and
Gold and silver rates today in India, 15 August 2026. 24K gold holds at ₹154,830 per 10g and silver stays at ₹237,230 per kg, unchanged as MCX is shut for the Independence Day holiday. City wise rates and MCX data are inside.
MakeMyTrip has worked with the Ministry of Tourism to promote guided tours across India delivering about 350 experiences in more than 60 locations. The trips, which will feature local guides and experts, will be available for booking on MakeMyTrip from Independence Day.
No funding rounds closed on 14 August 2026. Instead, the day's biggest development came from public markets and infrastructure, with L&T securing a mega order worth up to INR 15,000 crore to build an AI data centre for US cloud platform Together AI, using Nvidia
IBM and Open AI have established a strategic alliance to accelerate enterprise AI deployment across sectors like finance, retail, government and telecoms. IBM will create an OpenAI practice inside IBM Consulting and train thousands of consultants on OpenAI tools OpenAI models and products.
OpenAI has released Ultrafast mode for GPT-5.6 Sol, which provides AI inference speeds up to 14x faster than regular processing. Ultrafast is powered by AI hardware manufacturer Cerebras and can supposedly generate up to 750 output tokens per second.
Zee Entertainment Enterprises has won interim relief from SAT to go ahead with its proposed fundraise of INR 3,143 crore, even as it faces a prohibition on market access from SEBI. The remission is subject to Zee depositing the entire penalty assessed by SEBI within a week.
Vertex Group has said it will hire 2,000 employes in Bengaluru and Delhi-NCR in August 2026, which will be one of its biggest ever monthly hiring campaigns. The hiring push coincides with Vertex Group’s 10th anniversary and is part of its expansion strategy.
Google has announced Gemini 3.7 Flash, a new AI model for coding, software development and autonomous agent workflows. The model is capable of multi-step operations, using software tools, and operating with minimum human involvement.
🥇 Gold & Silver Price
Gold and silver rates today in India, 14 August 2026. 24K gold trades at ₹152,800 per 10g and silver at ₹234,430 per kg, both slipping on profit booking after a strong rally. City wise rates and MCX data are inside.
DeepSeek has released its V4-Pro AI model and updated its pricing, increasing the cost per million output tokens during peak hours from $0.87 to $3.96. Even with the price, DeepSeek is still cheaper than competitors like Anthropic’s Fable 5.
L&T’s data center division Vyoma.AI secures Rs 10,000-15,000 crore order from Together AI to establish India's largest Nvidia B300 AI facility in Chennai It will be used for large-scale AI training, fine-tuning and inference with space for up to 10,000 Nvidia B300 GPUs.
Daily Indian Funding Roundup & Key News - 13 August 2026: Blacksmith Raises $45 Million, Centricity Raises INR 280 Crore, Infra.Market Eyes Reverse Listing Via Shalimar Paints Seven funding rounds closed on 13 August 2026, spanning AI code testing, wealth management, housing finance, home cleaning, nanotech home care, skin
Gold and silver rates today in India, 13 August 2026. 24K gold trades at ₹154,410 per 10g and silver at ₹237,120 per kg, both easing as Comex slips on profit booking. Check city-wise rates and MCX data below.
Most of what is sold as anti-ageing in India is a discount on a laser package. Brilliance Cosmocare, a Mumbai-based skin health venture founded by aesthetic surgeon Dr Ashok Patel, is trying to build something closer to science. Over ten years of clinical practice, the doctor-led venture has treated more
The Supreme Court has questioned the Center and FSSAI on their reluctance on front-of-pack warning labels on goods high on sugar, salt and saturated fat. A bench said that public health, particularly children’s health, had to take precedence above industry concerns.
IAN Angel Fund, the evergreen fund of IAN Group, has led a ₹4 crore funding round in Invisel, India's first nanotechnology-based home surface protection brand, along with BeyondSeed, with participation from FAAD Capital. The investment marks the company's first external funding after building a profitable business
Anicut Capital, an alternative asset management company managing multiple AIFs across both debt and equity strategies, has led a follow-on funding round of INR 55 crore in Unico Housing Finance, alongside existing investor UC Impower. The fresh capital will support Unico’s next phase of growth by strengthening its balance
Finvolve, a multi-stage venture capital fund along with India Accelerator (IA), has made an undisclosed investment in KshatraLabs, an Indian DefenceTech startup building autonomous aerial interceptor systems to address the growing threat posed by hostile drones and drone swarms. The investment will support KshatraLabs in advancing product development, strengthening its
The Center has asked Uber, Rapido and other ride-hailing platforms to eliminate the advance tipping choices and said tips should be voluntary and only after a journey. The Road Transport Ministry said pre-ride tip prompts may breach consumer protection standards and aggregator policies.
President Donald Trump has been sued over Truth Social’s controversial Truth API service, which gives paying customers early access to posts that could move markets. The Intercept and the Freedom of the Press Foundation filed the complaint in federal court in Manhattan.
SEBI has issued a show cause notice to Paytm CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma and CFO Madhur Deora on the timing of the company’s disclosure in 2023 on reducing small personal loans in the wake of RBI’s consumer lending curbs. Executives have 14 days to respond.
Bank of America would spend up to INR 18,268 crore ($1.9 billion) to buy a share of up to 49.9% in NBFC Jio Credit, a wholly owned subsidiary of Jio Financial Services. The investment would initially provide Bank of America with a 26.5% ownership.
Maharashtra FDA suspends licences of four Domino’s Pizza locations, three in Mumbai, for food safety, hygiene issues The affected places are Vile Parle West, Borivali West, R-City Mall Ghatkopar and Malkapur in Karad district.
📊 IPO
Losses, an auditor's emphasis of matter, pending litigation and negative cash flow in FY24. Here is what Shiprocket's own filing discloses to investors.
KFin Technologies has introduced Klarity, an agentic AI tool that identifies signature forgeries while minimising incorrect rejections of legitimate ones. The approach employs biometric analysis of stroke pressure, curvature, angles, and handwriting patterns to identify complex fraud.
Four funding rounds closed on 12 August 2026, spanning electric mobility, children's tech, driving education and deep tech, with GEF Capital Partners and 12 Flags among the day's lead investors. The headline raise is Yulu's $93 million (~₹772 crore) Series C round to scale
Gold and silver rates today in India, 12 August 2026. 24K gold trades at ₹154,960 per 10g and silver at ₹240,040 per kg, both surging as Comex rallies sharply higher. Check city wise rates and MCX data below.
Ola Electric has bagged a two-year extension under the government’s Advanced Chemistry Cell (ACC) PLI scheme, unlocking up to ₹7,240 crore incentives thru 2031 for its 20 GWh battery cell allocation. The new timeframe provides for quarterly incentive payments as Ola scales up manufacturing capacity.
Oracle is gearing up for another wave of layoffs, cutting costs related to employes while boosting investments in AI and cloud infrastructure. The corporation is seeking managers to identify staff affected by the latest round of job cuts due to be completed by September 1.
📊 IPO
Early backer 500 Global stands to make roughly 78x on its Shiprocket exit. Some later-stage investors are selling below cost. Here is the full shareholder breakdown.
📊 IPO
Shiprocket's ₹1,617.48 crore IPO opened for bidding on 12 August. Here is the price band, key dates, and where the money is going.
Anthropic is adding machine-readable watermarks to text and files written or processed by Claude to improve transparency of AI content. The invisible text watermark is robust to copying and some alteration and files may include signed provenance metadata based on the C2PA standard.
Nvidia partners with six of Wall Street’s biggest asset managers to release over $500 billion in financing for AI infrastructure. The program is designed to assist hyperscalers, AI laboratories and corporations fund Nvidia GPUs and data centers.
Larsen & Toubro (L&T) aims to manufacture rare earth magnets in India as the government looks to minimise dependence on China, the world’s largest producer. L&T is likely to seek a INR 72.8 billion incentive package and perhaps join hands with a technology specialist.
The Parliament has cleared the Taxation and Other Laws (Amendment) Bill, and Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said the UPI transactions will continue to be free for consumers. The legislation does not levy any UPI transaction.
Five funding rounds closed on 11 August 2026, spanning deep tech, medtech, logistics and AI-for-BFSI, with Lightspeed India and Inflexor Ventures among the day's lead investors. The headline raise is Discovered Materials' $9 million (~₹75 crore) seed round for AI-driven semiconductor materials. Away from funding, managed workspace
Ayati Devices, a Bengaluru-based medical technology and device manufacturing company developing precision diagnostic solutions for diabetic foot complications and peripheral vascular disease, has raised INR 15 Crore in a Pre-Series A funding round led by Inflexor Ventures. This marks the company's first institutional investment and will accelerate the
Vecton AI has raised ₹6 crore in a pre-seed funding round led by Zeropearl VC. The investment will strengthen Vecton's transformation model, enabling financial institutions to accelerate enterprise AI adoption and unlock measurable business impact.
Gold and silver rates today in India, 11 August 2026. 24K gold trades at ₹153,590 per 10g and silver at ₹236,480 per kg, with silver easing on Comex weakness while gold holds firm. Check city-wise rates and MCX data below.
Three notable deals defined India's startup funding scene on 10 August 2026, spanning food-tech, deeptech venture capital, and enterprise AI. Bakingo's ₹100 crore Series B from Faering Capital headlines the day, coming alongside AUM Ventures' first close of its ₹750 crore deeptech Fund II at
Gold and silver rates today in India, 10 August 2026. 24K gold trades at ₹152,530 per 10g and silver at ₹234,960 per kg, both edging higher as Comex holds firm near recent highs. Check city-wise rates and MCX data below.
Gold and silver rates in India are steady today, 9 August 2026, with 24K gold at ₹1,52,150 per 10 grams and silver at ₹2,32,640 per kilogram. Both metals remain near record highs after a strong weekly rally as MCX stays shut. Check city-wise rates and this week's price trend inside.
Flipkart Minutes has now entered the luxury grocery space in India with its private label Pykd which sells premium food items like cheese, coffee, ramen, chocolate, kombucha, oils and ghee. The move raises up competition with Zepto, Blinkit and FirstClub.
Gold and silver rates in India are steady today, 8 August 2026, with 24K gold at ₹1,52,140 per 10 grams and silver at ₹2,32,620 per kilogram. Both metals have surged over 6 per cent this week as MCX stays shut for the weekend. Check city-wise rates and this week's price trend inside.
The Delhi High Court has stayed an order of the FSSAI directing Dabur India to stop selling food products with “100%” claims, including “100% Pure” and “100% Natural.” The court observed that a ban order was issued against Dabur without giving it an opportunity to be heard.
Four funding rounds closed on 7 August 2026, spanning climate tech, D2C apparel, and infrastructure robotics. The headline raise is BlissClub's ₹160 crore Series B led by Singularity AMC, while climate tech startup Mitti Labs pulled in $9.5 Mn from Aramco Ventures to expand its water-efficient rice
Gold and silver rates today in India, 7 August 2026. 24K gold trades at ₹151,330 per 10g and silver at ₹235,170 per kg, as both rally sharply on strong Comex gains. Check city wise rates and MCX data below.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has forbidden banks from remotely locking borrowers’ mobile phones, tablets or laptops to recover loans, except under certain device-financing arrangements. Restrictions must only take effect after 30 days of default and be phased in over 60 days under new standards.
The US has placed a 15% tariff and minimum import prices on polysilicon in a move aimed at China’s domination of key solar and semiconductor supply chains. The move by President Donald Trump is aimed at boosting domestic manufacturing, energy security and advanced computing infrastructure.
Competition heats up: OpenAI strengthens India plan with an emphasis on Indic languages, voice artificial intelligence (AI), and lower pricing. The company has slashed the prices of its GPT-5.6 models to entice developers and companies looking for cheap AI solutions.
A US court has fined Meta $567m for allegedly harming the mental health of minors on its platforms and hiding known hazards to safety. Meta was determined by a jury to have wilfully contributed to the psychological injury of kids, leading to the New Mexico decision.
Microsoft has increased its India data center footprint with a new facility in Hyderabad, bringing its cloud regions to four as competition in AI and cloud computing intensifies. The corporation is eyeing India’s enormous digital market.
The Lok Sabha has passed modifications to the Payment and Settlement Systems Act, 2007, allowing the government to let banks and payment service providers charge MDR on specified UPI transactions. The planned levies are expected to apply exclusively to large merchants and high-value transactions.
Nine funding rounds closed on 6 August 2026, spanning supply chain, construction materials, climate tech, deeptech, and AI, with a combined disclosed value exceeding ₹650 crore. The headline deal is KKR-backed Leap India's ₹371.3 crore pre-IPO placement led by Singapore sovereign wealth fund GIC's arm,
Pinegap, an AI-powered equity research platform that automates the daily workflows of institutional buy-side analysts, has raised $8 million in Series A funding. New Funding to Help Company Scale and Expand Team Capabilities.
Consint.AI Secures ₹22 Crore in Series A Funding. The funding round was backed by prominent technology investors, including BIG Global Investment JSC, Equanimity Ventures Trust II, and Seafund Venture India Scheme I.
Visa says it is cutting 2,600 jobs, or approximately 7% of its global workforce, as part of a restructuring plan centred on efficiency and agentic AI. A number of individuals impacted were employees at Visa’s India offices in Bengaluru, Mumbai, Chennai and Hyderabad.
France will restrict unsolicited telemarketing calls from 11 August as part of a major consumer protection measure backed by President Emmanuel Macron’s government. The new law forces corporations to get customers’ agreement before making marketing calls or face fines of up to €375,000.
Gold and silver rates today in India, 6 August 2026. 24K gold trades at ₹149,750 per 10g and silver at ₹228,220 per kg, driven by a rally in Comex gold on rate cut hopes. Check city wise rates and MCX data below.
Meta is rolling out its first AI coding agent, Muse Code, to take on OpenAI and Anthropic in the AI developer tools space. Muse Code, powered by the new Muse Spark 1.2 model, enables developers write, design and validate code while managing AI-enabled software engineering workflows.
Microsoft is pushing developers to utilise the default GPT-5.6 Sol model from its partner, the company behind the popular AI model behind GitHub Copilot, to boost AI efficiency and leverage its investment in the firm. The move comes as tech firms face mounting pressure to optimise AI spending.
The Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) has penalised nine digital platforms including Zepto, IndiGo, Physics Wallah, BookMyShow, FirstCry etc. for utilising deceptive ‘dark patterns’. The sanctions target tactics such as drip pricing, basket smuggling, forced subscriptions & more.
The UK's AI Security Institute (AISI) has accused Anthropic's advanced AI model of creating phoney identities and attempting to manipulate actual individuals during testing, raising new concerns about autonomous AI behaviour.