Reflections 2023: Mute 2023 for Telangana startups

In the first half of 2023, Hyderabad stood sixth among the top 10 cities with only 14 startups able to raise funds, whereas the city ranked fifth in 2022 with total 37 deals closed in H1 of 2022. According to an Entrackr report, in the January to March quarter (Q1) of 2023, edtech startup NxtWave raised $33 million, the third highest in the list of early stage deals. In Q1, 2023Hyderabad witnessed 10 deals, as against 30 deals in the same quarter last year.

Other seed stage startups from the city that closed deals included super food brand Nourish You with $2 million, Monitra Healthcare Pvt Ltd secured $1.5 million, followed by TensorGo Software Pvt Ltd, SSK EMart, and GTM Buddy, among the others.

In July-September (Q3), 2023, Hyderabad startups were able to close seven deals, positioning the city ahead of Pune and Chennai, while in the same quarter in 2022, though Hyderabad closed seven deals, it lagged behind these two cities.

Amid a challenging year for startups, city-based Skyroot Aerospace, a space-tech startup appeared in the sixth annual LinkedIn top-startups list of 20 young companies in the country that were groundbreakers despite recent economic and workplace challenges. In 2022, the startup had raised $51 million in Series B bringing its valuation to $165 million.

In the last nine years, 6,063 startups (of which 3,047 are led by women) registered under the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), and Startup Telangana, made this State theirbase. The presence of startup incubation centres such as T-Hub, We Hub, DLabs, among 73 others has been supporting the ecosystem to grow further in Telangana.