India is quickly becoming one of the top countries in the world when it comes to embracing Artificial Intelligence (AI). With a fast-growing economy and highly skilled talent, the country is moving forward with big plans in the digital space. Experts believe that India’s Generative AI market will cross $17 billion by 2030. AI is also expected to play a major role in helping India reach its goal of becoming a $1 trillion digital economy by 2028.
To support this growing sector, the Indian government has introduced the IndiaAI Mission, focusing on the use and development of AI technologies across industries.
Joining hands with this national vision, Google has announced the launch of applications for the Google for Startups Accelerator: AI First India 2025 program. This initiative, supported by the MeitY Startup Hub, is designed to help startups that are working on cutting-edge AI solutions.
This year, the program is especially looking for startups that are exploring Agentic AI and Multimodal AI – two areas expected to be at the heart of the next big wave of AI innovations. Startups that are building AI-driven products, applications, reasoning models, or foundational AI technologies and are currently in the Seed to Series A funding stage are encouraged to apply before 30th June 2025.
What selected startups will get:
- Expert Mentorship: Startups will receive one-on-one guidance from mentors, industry professionals, and Google team members from departments like Google Cloud, Android, Ads, DeepMind, and more.
- Customized Support: Weekly check-ins with startup success managers to help startups meet their product, technology, growth, and hiring goals.
- Tools and Infrastructure: Eligible startups will get free access to Cloud TPUs, Google Cloud credits, and Google’s latest AI tools and models.
- Google AI Collaboration: Teams will work directly with Google’s AI experts on integrating powerful models like Gemini, Gemma, Imagen, and Veo into their products and solving technical challenges.
The previous edition of this accelerator program had a strong impact. Startups that participated collectively raised over $61 million in funding. They also saw major improvements in their products and were able to reach more users by integrating with the Google Cloud Marketplace.
For instance:
- SpotDraft improved its AI-based contract management by integrating Gemini API, reducing costs by 80%, increasing accuracy by 30%, and cutting down latency by 70%.
- Kroop AI saw a 40% boost in customer engagement and better pricing for its deepfake detection services.
- Merlin AI, an AI-powered productivity app, used Gemini’s long-context feature to improve document processing for over 2 million users.
With such strong results from last year, Google is now set to support the next generation of AI startups in India through this accelerator. Interested startups can visit the official website and apply before the deadline on 30th June 2025.
