India Tech Report

Tag: climate finance

  • India’s climate tech hits $12.8 billion in cumulative funding (Tracxn press release text)

    India’s climate tech hits $12.8 billion in cumulative funding (Tracxn press release text)

    Infographic from Tracxn’s India Climate Tech 2026 Report. Courtesy Tracxn.

    Tracxn, a global market intelligence platform for private company data, released its India Climate Tech 2026 Report, a comprehensive analysis of an ecosystem where climate action is increasingly tied to India’s energy-security and industrial priorities. 

    The report examines how funding activity, company formation, investor participation, and policy are developing across India’s climate-tech ecosystem, drawing on Tracxn’s coverage of the sector. It identifies where capital is concentrating, which segments are drawing the widest participation, and how a maturing policy framework is shaping the opportunities available to founders and investors.

    Highlights

    • India’s climate-tech companies have attracted approximately $12.8B and 1,583 funded companies, with annual funding rising from about $315M in 2020 to $2.6B in 2025.
    • Policy, private capital and energy security are converging on the same sectors. With roughly 85% of India’s crude oil imported, renewable energy, electric mobility, batteries and critical minerals now serve both decarbonisation and energy-independence goals.
    • Capital is consolidating into larger, conviction-led rounds, led by Inox Clean Energy’s $344M Series D (2026) and Erisha E Mobility’s $1B Series D (2025), with development finance institutions such as British International Investment, IFC and FMO actively participating.
    • Renewable Energy Tech leads cumulative funding at $1.5B, while Solid Waste Management ($477M), Energy Efficiency ($352M), Air Pollution Management ($237M) and Water & Wastewater Management ($208M) show the opportunity broadening across the ecosystem.
    • 2026 YTD funding stands at $791M across 74 rounds, with 66% of funding concentrated in just 5 late-stage rounds, signalling a flight to conviction-led plays.

    Policy, Capital and Energy Security Are Aligning

    With roughly 85% of India’s crude oil imported, the same technologies — renewable energy, electric mobility, batteries and critical minerals — increasingly address energy security alongside climate goals, giving the investment case two reinforcing drivers. India’s climate-policy framework has moved from supporting technology adoption to building the conditions for large-scale deployment. PM E-DRIVE, a ₹10,900 crore programme extended to 2028, supports electric-vehicle adoption and charging infrastructure; the Carbon Credit Trading Scheme, effective October 2026, establishes a compliance carbon market covering around 490 industrial units across nine sectors; and the Rare Earth Permanent Magnets scheme, a ₹7,280 crore programme, strengthens domestic clean-energy supply chains. 

    Funding Has Scaled and Is Concentrating in Larger Rounds

    Annual funding rose from about $315M in 2020 to $2.6B in 2025, with capital increasingly directed toward larger, conviction-led transactions in electric mobility, renewable energy and energy-transition infrastructure. Landmark rounds include Inox Clean Energy’s $344M Series D in 2026 and Erisha E Mobility’s $1B Series D in 2025. British International Investment participated in three rounds (Euler Motors, GreenCell Mobility and Ecofy), alongside IFC, FMO and Finnfund – reflecting sustained institutional confidence in India’s energy transition.

    Renewable Energy Leads, With the Opportunity Broadening

    Renewable Energy Tech leads cumulative funding at $1.5B, supported by the capital-intensive nature of renewable-energy and grid infrastructure, with Inox Clean Energy’s $344M Series D and $70M Series C among its notable rounds. Beyond generation, Solid Waste Management Tech ($477M), Energy Efficiency Tech ($352M), Air Pollution Management Tech ($237M) and Water & Wastewater Management Tech ($208M) have together attracted more than $1.2B, pointing to a widening opportunity across resource efficiency, environmental management and industrial sustainability.

    As policy support, private capital and energy-security priorities increasingly point to the same set of technologies, India’s climate-tech market is positioned to deepen as well as grow.

    2026 YTD: Fewer, Larger, More Conviction-Led Rounds

    The first five months of 2026 reflect a market consolidating around scale and conviction, with $791M deployed across 74 rounds. Late-stage activity dominates at $524M across 5 deals, while seed funding stands at $61M across 44 rounds. Noida has emerged as the top funding city. Early-cycle signals remain selective, with 15 first-time funded companies, 6 new Soonicorns, 2 IPOs and 1 acquisition in YTD.

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  • Climake’s founders on their ‘most upbeat’ climate finance report yet on India

    Climake’s founders on their ‘most upbeat’ climate finance report yet on India

    In this episode, I’m joined by Simmi Sareen and Shravan Shankar, co-founders of Climake, a climate finance platform and advisory, to talk about their fifth annual report on the state of climate finance in India – 2025 edition.

    In 2024, equity capital deployed reached $9.4 billion, about double from the previous year, with public markets absorbing 60 percent of all funding. Simmi and Shravan also talk about some consequential shifts: such as the emergence of a public capital ecosystem that routes money to climate solutions that can be vital while not being attractive to venture capital investors.

    The two co-founders have formally tracked this evolution ever since they founded Climake in the middle of the Covid pandemic, and much longer in various capacities before that. Simmi brings to Climake two decades of mainstream finance experience, including at a global investment bank, and she’s previously built a climate-focused fintech and debt platform.

    Shravan has built his career across sustainability policy, innovation ecosystems, and climate entrepreneurship. Their annual State of Climate Finance reports are increasingly widely accepted in the industry as investor look at India-specific decisions.

    In this conversation they talk about what their fifth report reveals: a $2 trillion capital requirement through 2035, a substantive shift toward adaptation financing, and the expanding role of public markets in sectors like wastewater treatment and solar components that aren’t attractive from a VC’s perspective.

    The discussion spans emerging technologies from sustainable fuels and flow batteries to seaweed-based biochar solutions, the persistent gaps in growth-stage capital for asset-heavy climate enterprises, and how adaptation will reshape investment contours as it becomes increasingly urgent.

  • Vishal Katariya at Ankur Capital on the climate tech opportunity in India

    Vishal Katariya at Ankur Capital on the climate tech opportunity in India

    My guest today is Vishal Katariya, a member of the investment team at Ankur Capital, an early-stage venture capital firm in Mumbai. Vishal is based in Bengaluru.

    It’s World Environment Day today, and Vishal’s here to talk about why and how India is uniquely positioned to lead in building climate solutions that work for the world. Vishal is one of the authors of Ankur’s recent report on private investments in climate tech, titled Transforming India’s Core Sectors, along with Ankur’s founding managing partner Ritu Verma, Shiva Shanker, a partner, and Debansh Sahoo, who’s also on the firm’s investment team.

    To quote from a brief on the report, entrepreneurs are drawing on India’s deep talent pool, a problem-solving mindset shaped by constraint, and a lived understanding of the Global South – not to chase emissions reductions alone, but because industries increasingly recognize that rethinking how we produce, grow, move, and power things is critical to staying competitive and creating long-term economic value in a changing world.

    The report presents a data-backed analysis of how startups and venture investments are shaping these efforts. It tracks 2020–2024 funding trends across India and global markets in five sectors: energy, food and land use, transportation, industrial decarbonization, and carbon and climate management.

    In this conversation, Vishal walks us through a quick overview of Ankur’s findings and briefly touches upon the implications for founders and investors.