Activate, a venture capital firm founded by Haptik co-founder Aakrit Vaish and former Together Fund partner Pratyush Choudhury, has closed its maiden fund at $105 million to back India’s early and growth-stage AI startups. The fund, which closed on September 16, comprises an $85 million pool for early-stage bets and a $20 million allocation for growth-stage investments.
Activate was set up in December 2025 with the specific mandate of backing India’s “next wave” of AI-native companies, betting that the country’s software talent and falling compute costs will produce globally competitive AI products rather than just AI-enabled services. Vaish, who built and sold Haptik to Reliance Jio, is positioning the fund around founders building AI-first products from day one rather than retrofitting AI onto existing software.
How Big Is India’s AI Startup Funding Opportunity?
India currently has around 2,900 AI companies, of which 605 are funded and have collectively raised $6.57 billion in venture capital and private equity, including 127 companies that have reached Series A or beyond and eight unicorns. Roughly 317 new AI startups have been founded in India so far in 2026 alone, and India’s IT minister has said 80% of the country’s startups today are AI-led in some form. Activate’s $105 million fund adds meaningfully to the pool of dedicated early-stage AI capital in a market where most large funds still write generalist checks across sectors.
What Does This Mean for Indian AI Founders?
A dedicated $85 million early-stage sleeve gives Indian AI founders a domestic investor that understands product-market fit challenges specific to AI companies, such as compute cost management, data access and model differentiation, rather than treating AI as just another software vertical. The $20 million growth-stage allocation also signals that Activate plans to follow on into portfolio companies as they scale, reducing the need for founders to immediately chase foreign growth capital. This comes as government-backed efforts, including a $1 billion India Deep Tech Alliance announced at Semicon India 2025 and a ₹1 lakh crore Research, Development and Innovation Fund, are also expanding the capital available to India’s innovation ecosystem.
Industry Reaction and Expert Commentary
Vaish’s own background building and exiting an AI-first conversational commerce company gives the fund credibility with founders navigating similar build-and-scale challenges. Investors backing the fund are betting that India’s cost advantage in engineering talent, combined with growing enterprise demand for AI tools in sectors like fintech, healthtech and B2B SaaS, will produce breakout companies over the next fund cycle, even as global AI infrastructure investment remains concentrated in the US and China.
What Happens Next?
Activate is expected to begin deploying capital from the $105 million fund into early-stage AI startups in the coming months, with growth-stage checks following as portfolio companies hit scaling milestones. Watch for the fund’s first disclosed investments and whether it prioritises enterprise AI, consumer AI, or infrastructure-layer startups as its initial thesis plays out.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much did Activate raise and when did the fund close?
Activate closed its maiden fund at $105 million on September 16, 2026, split into an $85 million early-stage fund and a $20 million growth-stage allocation.
Who founded Activate?
Activate was founded by Aakrit Vaish, former CEO and co-founder of Haptik, and Pratyush Choudhury, a former partner at Together Fund.
What kind of startups will Activate invest in?
The fund will back India’s early and growth-stage AI-native startups, with a focus on companies building AI-first products rather than adding AI features to existing software.
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