Hyderabad to host debut ET Soonicorns Sundowner series: India's product-first startup stars step into the spotlight
Empower your mind, elevate your skills
Rohit Chennamaneni , Co-founder, Darwinbox
, Co-founder, Darwinbox Dr. Raj P. Narayanam , Founder & Executive Chairman, Zaggle
, Founder & Executive Chairman, Zaggle Prasad Vanga , Founder & CEO, Anthill Ventures
, Founder & CEO, Anthill Ventures Kavikrut, CEO, T-Hub
The region's P0 sectors, such as HRTech and Healthcare Booking, with over $640M in cumulative funding.
The P1 sectors, such as EV and BeautyTech, which are drawing high-conviction capital and churning out minicorns at speed
Skyroot Aerospace – Why spacetech needs patient capital—and why India can't afford to wait
– Why spacetech needs patient capital—and why India can't afford to wait PURE EV – From garage to gigafactory: Building India's mid-market EV brand
India's next unicorns aren't just coming from the usual suspects anymore. The momentum is shifting. From deeptech disruptors building satellites to electric vehicle (EV) pioneers manufacturing batteries at scale, Hyderabad is quietly emerging as a force to reckon with in India's innovation economy.And now, the spotlight is officially shifting. The ET Soonicorns Summit , India's largest platform dedicated to the next generation of unicorns, is back with its fourth edition on August 22, 2025. But this year, it's not just staying rooted in Bengaluru. It's hitting the road.Kicking off this expansion is the ET Soonicorns Sundowner series , a first-of-its-kind spin-off bringing high-impact startup gatherings to India's most promising, yet undercelebrated, tech corridors. First stop? Hyderabad.On July 31, the ET Soonicorns Sundowner Hyderabad will bring together unicorns, soonicorns, and minicorns, investors, and policymakers for a high-energy evening of panels, storytelling, and pitch-perfect insights.Here's why this event is a must-watch—and why Hyderabad's time has finally come.Think of it as the after-hours accelerator for India's most promising startup hubs. The Sundowner Series is a curated city-level celebration of emerging unicorns, designed to complement the main ET Soonicorns Summit in Bengaluru. Each edition brings regional founders, investors, and ecosystem enablers together in a fast-paced, insight-heavy format—with sharp data drops, real founder stories, and zero fluff.Hyderabad is the first in this series, and its inclusion is no accident.Home to capital-efficient fintech plays, business-to-business (B2B) software-as-a-service (SaaS) champions, private spacetech ventures, and EV infrastructure startups, Hyderabad is writing a new playbook—product-first, hype-last.According to the data intelligence platform Tracxn, the city commands 99.7% of all startup capital in the Andhra Pradesh–Telangana region, making it the undisputed anchor of southern India's deeptech landscape.Founders here build before they broadcast. They prototype before they pitch. And they scale—often profitably—before they seek capital. This is the anti-hype hub India didn't know it needed.The Hyderabad Sundowner promises a rapid-fire, content-rich format over a single evening, and it packs a punch.The evening opens with a keynote panel: 'Built in Hyderabad: The Rise of India's Product-First, Hype-Last Startups.' This conversation sets the tone for the evening, spotlighting Hyderabad's distinctive approach to innovation and company-building.Expect sharp insights from:This session dives into Hyderabad's unique startup DNA—spanning capital discipline, deep R&D, and enterprise-first growth. Case in point? Skyroot Aerospace, which built India's first private rocket not by chasing headlines, but by engineering excellence. Or PURE EV, which prioritised battery tech over buzz and now leads mid-market EV growth.From deeptech to fintech, the panel explores how Hyderabad founders are rewriting India's startup script. These are not outliers but narratives of a regional ethos that values substance over spectacle.To ground these conversations in data, a first-of-its-kind report by Economic Times X Tracxn will unveil the Top Sonicorns and Minicorns across the Top 10 Sectors of the Andhra Pradesh–Telangana startup cluster. Based on investment and growth data from January 2020 to May 2025, the report spotlights:Launching the report will be Jayesh Ranjan, IAS, Special Chief Secretary, Govt. of Telangana, underscoring official support for Hyderabad's innovation ambitions.The momentum continues with a high-energy storytelling session, bringing real founders with real inflection points to the forefront. This format gives startup leaders the mic for three-minute lightning stories—no decks, just raw, unfiltered experiences of pivot, perseverance, or breakout wins.Confirmed storytellers include:Each story will be followed by a quick Q&A, creating space for insight, debate, and real-time connection with the ecosystem.The evening culminates in cocktails, conversations, and capital connects. With a curated guest list of founders, venture capitalists, and ecosystem enablers, the networking session is designed for high-value collisions, not just handshakes.What makes the Hyderabad ecosystem different isn't just the companies—it's the culture.Many of Hyderabad's best-performing startups—such as Darwinbox, Skyroot, and Dhruva Space—bootstrapped longer, scaled smarter, and raised later.Founders here are often institutionally rooted (think BITS Pilani, IIIT-H, or ISRO partnerships), which results in deeper tech, cleaner cap tables, and sharper product-market fit. Even VCs agree: late-stage deals are picking up because the groundwork is stronger.In an age where PR often outpaces product, Hyderabad is turning patient innovation into scalable disruption.The ET Soonicorns Sundowner in Hyderabad isn't just a gathering—it's a declaration. Of depth over dazzle. Of product over posturing. And the rise of India's next unicorn belt beyond Bengaluru.So, whether you're an investor looking for uncut gems, a founder seeking like-minded builders, or simply someone who believes real innovation doesn't scream—it scales, this is where you need to be.360 One is the presenting partner of the ET Soonicorns Summit 2025.
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Time of India
7 hours ago
- Time of India
ET Soonicorns Summit grows its footprint with Hyderabad launch of ET Soonicorns Sundowner series
ET Spotlight Report Unveiling Academy Empower your mind, elevate your skills ET Special Jayesh Ranjan, Principal Secretary (I&C), Government of Telangana ET Special Dr. Raj Narayanam, Founder, Zaggle , GV Keshav Reddy, Founder, Equal & Board Member, Reddy Ventures, Prasad Vanga, Founder & CEO, Anthill Ventures, Sandeep Maheshwari, Senior Fund Manager, 360 ONE Asset, Kavikrut, CEO, T-Hub, Deepak Ajwani, Editor, Dr. Raj P. Narayanam, Founder & Executive Chairman, Zaggle GV Keshav Reddy, Founder, Equal & Board Member, Reddy Ventures Prasad Vanga, Founder & CEO, Anthill Ventures Sandeep Maheshwari – Senior Fund Manager, 360 ONE Asset Kavikrut, CEO, T-Hub ET Special Dr. Raj P. Narayanam, Founder & Executive Chairman, Zaggle ET Special Sandeep Maheshwari – Senior Fund Manager, 360 ONE Asset ET Special Kavikrut, CEO of T-Hub ET Special GV Keshav Reddy, Founder, Equal & Board Member, Reddy Ventures ET Special Kishore Tallam, CFO at Skyroot, Nishanth Dongari On a balmy July evening in Hyderabad, as the sun dipped behind the skyline of Knowledge City, a different kind of spark lit up the city—a spark of ambition, resilience, and realism. The inaugural edition of ET Soonicorns Sundowner took off on July 31, 2025, in the heart of India's newest startup innovation corridor. This marked the launch of a high-powered regional spin-off from the flagship ET Soonicorns Summit, now in its fourth year and slated for a grand return in Bengaluru on 22 August ET Soonicorns Summit initiative, originally conceived as a data-driven list, has evolved into a multi-city franchise that recognises startups with growth potential. Hyderabad was the natural choice to kickstart the Sundowner series, given that it is an increasingly vital innovation hub, yet often Sundowner format may be breezier in tone, but make no mistake—Hyderabad's edition delivered heavyweight insights and hard data in equal measure.A tribute to the grit behind the gloss in India's startup story, the evening delivered a three-part punch: the unveiling of the ET Top Soonicorns and Minicorns X Priority Sectors Telangana-Andhra Pradesh 2025 report, a high-wattage founder-investor panel on Hyderabad's product-first DNA, and a raw, open-mic finale featuring founder stories that rarely make it to pitch decks.A key highlight was the official unveiling of the ET Top Soonicorns and Minicorns X Priority Sectors Telangana-Andhra Pradesh 2025—a comprehensive cluster map of the regional startup ecosystem, curated in collaboration with research partner Tracxn, a data intelligence report identifies breakout companies and signals sectoral shifts in one of India's fastest-rising tech corridors, whilst analysing funding patterns, capital flows, and high-growth soonicorns and minicorns poised to produce the region's next Ranjan, Principal Secretary (I&C), Government of Telangana, Sandeep Maheshwari – Senior Fund Manager, 360 ONE Asset, and Deepak Ajwani, Editor, jointly launched the report to a packed a special address, Jayesh Ranjan, IAS, reflected on the government's proactive stance in catalysing innovation since 2014: 'We believed the government could strategically solve ecosystem pain points. And I think we've proven that. But we could do more, especially in accelerating those on the cusp of unicorn status.'Importantly, Ranjan extended an open invitation to founders: 'If you need help and the government can play a role, we'll do it.'If the report offered the data, the panel delivered the lived reality of building quietly, purposefully, and against the by Deepak Ajwani, Editor, the session featured a formidable lineup:The discussion that followed was equal parts rooted and revealing. GV Keshav Reddy, Founder of Equal and Board Member at Reddy Ventures, spoke with clarity on Hyderabad's appeal: 'I could have started Equal in any major city, but we chose Hyderabad. Purpose, culture, lower cost, better lifestyle—it's a founder-friendly city. Out of our 100 people, 81 moved here from other metros with no prior connection.'Prasad Vanga, Founder and CEO of Anthill Ventures, shared his own pivot back to the city: 'I built my first company in Bangalore, then moved to the US. When we returned to India, I thought we'd go back to Bangalore. But my wife won—her parents are in Hyderabad. Ten years later, we're still here.'Dr. Raj P. Narayanam, Founder & Executive Chairman, Zaggle, who traded New York for Delhi before choosing Hyderabad, offered a flavourful metaphor: 'This city is like biryani—slow-cooked overnight. That's how businesses should be built.' He emphasised Hyderabad's USP of 'quiet focus and fewer distractions'.His view was echoed by Sandeep Maheshwari – Senior Fund Manager, 360 ONE Asset, as he pointed to Hyderabad's natural advantages in frontier sectors: 'Especially in defence and space, Hyderabad is uniquely positioned.'Offering the investor lens, he added: 'There's excellent engineering talent here and a frugal mindset—cost discipline is built in from day one.'Kavikrut, CEO of T-Hub, zoomed out to connect regional strength with national vision: 'This isn't a competition between cities. India needs 100 Bangalores and Hyderabads. The artificial intelligence (AI) wave won't be built in just one place—Hyderabad has the ingredients: top universities, large tech campuses, and deep talent pools.'But the panel didn't sugar-coat the journey. Ajwani's sharp question on hype cycles led to a candid response from Narayanam: 'I've never believed in 'fail fast' or 'scale fast.' My focus has always been revenue. Customers keep you grounded.'On navigating the AI boom and bust, Maheshwari didn't hold back: 'One release from OpenAI can wipe out 20,000 companies overnight.' For investors, he said, 'The only real moat is customer love—or regulatory licenses.'The consensus? Bet on founders, not just the discussion shifted to hype cycles, Narayanam stressed the importance of customer-first discipline: 'I've never believed in 'fail fast' or 'scale fast'. From Day One, my focus was revenue and staying close to the customer. The current AI downcycle is helping; we're acquiring great companies at good value.'Maheshwari added perspective on the volatility: 'One release from OpenAI can wipe out 20,000 companies. The only real moat today is customer love or regulatory moats like licenses.'When asked 'what not to do', the consensus was firm: 'Don't chase hype. Pivot with purpose. Founders who've pivoted and stayed in the game, that's who we look for,' said perhaps said it best: 'Find your niche, scale it to the deepest level, and keep pivoting. That's what keeps you alive.'Keshav Reddy's own story proved the point: 'We pivoted three times in three years—from personal data to health to financial services. Now we power a billion transactions a year.'When Ajwani posed the age-old dilemma—scale vs. sustainability—Reddy framed it as a false binary. 'The right answer is: sustainable scale.'The evening ended on a note of introspection about India's capital culture. 'We need patient capital,' said Narayanam. 'But there's none of it around.' Citing Flipkart's early struggles and the role of Tiger Global, he remarked, 'One man, one strategy—Lee Fixel changed everything.'The final segment, One Moment That Changed Everything, brought the mic to the founders. Three entrepreneurs shared pivotal moments of heartbreak, reinvention, and unexpected breakthroughs in an unscripted storytelling the lights dimmed and conversations spilled into corridors and cocktails, one thing was clear: the ET Soonicorns Sundowner isn't just another networking evening. It's a mirror, a spotlight, and a platform for founders building quietly, investors betting wisely, and ecosystems readying for the next intimate founder journeys, it offered a raw, real look at the emotional core of building a Tallam, CFO at Skyroot, Nishanth Dongari, Founder and MD of PURE EV, and Sankarsh Chanda, Founder - Stardour, took to the stage to share personal turning points—stories of pivots, heartbreaks, near-failures, and surprising a narrative-rich layer to the evening, the launch of the Limitless Founder Journeys: N to X report—featuring 20 behind-the-scenes stories curated by 360 ONE—brought founder voices to the fore in fine editions in Gurugram and Mumbai coming up, and the flagship ET Soonicorns Summit 2025 returning to Bengaluru on August 22, the stage is set. Hyderabad has raised the bar.360 One is the presenting partner of the ET Soonicorns Summit 2025. T-Hub is the ecosystem partner of the ET Soonicorns Sundowner 2025 Hyderabad edition.
Time of India
8 hours ago
- Time of India
ET Soonicorns Sundowner in Hyderabad sets the table for India's product-first startup future
On 31 July 2025, some of Hyderabad's important founders and funders met to participate in a panel. Here's what they had to say on redefining scale and substance at this panel, the centrepiece of the inaugural ET Soonicorns Sundowner series, a spin-off from the flagship ET Soonicorns Summit 2025. Tired of too many ads? Remove Ads Dr. Raj Narayanam, Founder, Zaggle , GV Keshav Reddy, Founder, Equal & Board Member, Reddy Ventures, Prasad Vanga, Founder & CEO, Anthill Ventures, Sandeep Maheshwari, Senior Fund Manager, 360 ONE Asset, Kavikrut, CEO, T-Hub, Moderated by Deepak Ajwani, Editor of Tired of too many ads? Remove Ads Prasad Vanga, Founder and CEO of Anthill Ventures Dr. Raj P. Narayanam, Founder and Executive Chairman of Zaggle Kavikrut, CEO of T-Hub Sandeep Maheshwari – Senior Fund Manager, 360 ONE Asset Tired of too many ads? Remove Ads 'Hyderabad is like biryani—slow-cooked overnight, flavourful. That's how businesses should be built; not rushed, but carefully over time,' said Dr. Raj P. Narayanam, Founder and Executive Chairman of fintech platform Zaggle, setting the tone for what would become a candid, thought-provoking, and richly insightful panel discussion on the rise of product-first startups from India's emerging innovation defining panel discussion—'Built in Hyderabad: The Rise of India's Product-First Startups'—was the centrepiece of the inaugural ET Soonicorns Sundowner in Hyderabad, held on 31 July 2025. The event marked the debut of a new after-hours format by The Economic Times, designed to spotlight regional startup ecosystems with high-growth potential. As a high-energy spin-off from the flagship ET Soonicorns Summit, which is returning to Bengaluru for its fourth edition on 22 August 2025, the Sundowner series now sets the tone for India's next wave of unicorn by Deepak Ajwani, Editor of the panel brought together a strong lineup of founders and investors: Dr. Raj Narayanam of Zaggle, GV Keshav Reddy, Founder of Equal and Board Member at Reddy Ventures, Prasad Vanga, Founder and CEO of Anthill Ventures, Sandeep Maheshwari – Senior Fund Manager, 360 ONE Asset, and Kavikrut, CEO of evening kicked off with a pointed question from Ajwani: Why Hyderabad?GV Keshav Reddy, Founder of Equal and Board Member at Reddy Ventures, who shifted his data-tech startup Equal to Hyderabad from Mumbai, answered without hesitation: 'Hyderabad, without a doubt, is the best city to live in right now. We brought 81 of our 100 people from Bombay (Mumbai), Delhi, and Bangalore (Bengaluru). Many are from Bangalore. You just book them a ticket, show them the office, and they stay.'He attributed this migration to a potent combination: purpose, culture, a lower cost of living, and a fast-maturing Vanga, Founder and CEO of Anthill Ventures, whose venture fund Anthill was one of the first to back startups out of T-Hub nearly a decade ago, shared a personal anecdote: 'I thought we'd return to Bangalore from the US. But my wife won—her parents are in Hyderabad. That's how we landed here. A decade later, we're still here. There's real camaraderie in this ecosystem.'For Dr. Raj P. Narayanam, Founder and Executive Chairman of Zaggle, the move was strategic: 'My uncle offered me an entire floor for my office, in exchange for some equity. We built a large team in Bangalore, but came back. Hyderabad gives you the quiet focus to build in stealth. Revenue is the goal, not just noise.'Talent, deep tech, and the new age of AIThe conversation widened from anecdotes to ecosystem CEO of T-Hub, framed it as a national opportunity: 'This isn't a zero-sum game between cities. For India to succeed, we need 100 Bangalores and Hyderabads. But what makes Hyderabad unique is talent. We've exported the best tech minds globally. Now's the time to bring them back.'Kavikrut cited Hyderabad's rising influence in AI, defence, and aerospace. 'We have top universities, big tech offices—Apple, Alexa, Microsoft—and a deep talent pool. The concentration of Fortune 2000 companies is rising. We're at an inflection point.'Sandeep Maheshwari – Senior Fund Manager, 360 ONE Asset, echoed this from an investor's lens: 'The ecosystem has matured beautifully. We're particularly bullish on defence and space. DRDO labs, PSUs, private innovators—Hyderabad is positioned like no other.'On the flipside of this momentum, however, is the volatility of artificial intelligence (AI) cycles.'Engineers expect you to ride every wave. Investors, too,' said Dr. Narayanam. 'But I never believed in 'fail fast' or 'scale fast'. My mantra has always been: stay close to the customer. Customers cut through the noise.'He admitted the AI downcycle has worked in his favour. 'In 2021-22, it was chaos. We lost great talent. Now we're acquiring solid companies at a good value. Hyderabad helps—less hype, more substance.'Maheshwari was blunt about the investment lens: 'One OpenAI release can wipe out 20,000 startups. The only real moat today is customer love, or regulatory ones like licenses. Application-layer AI is easy to prototype but hard to productionise.'T-Hub's Kavikrut agreed. 'We tell founders: benchmark globally. The best teams—such as Pulse, which builds product agents—have clarity and resilience. That mindset is what early-stage investors should back.'Ajwani steered the panel into familiar, yet vital territory: what not to said, 'Don't follow the hype cycle. Go against the grain. The truly successful founders are often the ones going the other way.'Maheshwari added, 'Adaptability is a high-value trait. Almost every founder we've seen succeed has pivoted. The 'what' remains, but the 'how' changes.'Kavikrut expanded on this: 'We actually look for founders who've pivoted and stayed in the game. It shows mental resilience—often more valuable than capital.'Dr. Narayanam brought in a hard-won perspective: 'If I had to do it again, I'd focus on small niches. You stay under the radar; VCs don't see the TAM, so they ignore you. That's where you build quietly, constantly pivoting.'Reddy added: 'We pivoted three times in three years—first personal data, then health, then financial services. Now, we power a billion transactions. Most people don't even know they're using us.'Vanga responded with nuance: 'It depends. High-scale, low-revenue businesses must chase scale. But if you're building with good margins, you lean towards sustainability.'Reddy summed it up succinctly: 'The right answer is sustainable scale.'Ajwani closed with a hard-hitting dilemma: When founders want to play long and VCs push for speed, who blinks first?Maheshwari replied with a laugh: 'Honestly, I'd like to blink first. But this depends on the stage. VC money is meant for scale. Traditional investors expecting instant profit derail founders. It becomes a lifestyle business. That's not how this works.'Dr. Narayanam added, 'India needs patient capital. But it doesn't exist. The VC model is imported. We need an India-specific version. Sometimes you need to spend ₹10 to earn ₹1, and that's a hard pill for investors.'He credited early disrupters: 'Tiger Global and Lee Fixel changed the game. They wrote the big cheques that others hesitated to. That's what changed our ecosystem.'If one theme defined the session, it was this: Hyderabad has emerged as a serious contender in deep innovation. Its product-first culture, engineering discipline, and rising investor confidence signal a shift that could shape India's startup story over the next as the ET Soonicorns Sundowner series suggests, this is only the beginning. The Hyderabad edition has set a high bar for upcoming Sundowners in Gurugram and Mumbai—expanding the franchise of the ET Soonicorns Summit, returning on 22 August a room full of changemakers, candid debates, and a renewed call for patient capital and deep IP, the Hyderabad Sundowner offered a glimpse into what its next startup frontier might truly look like. Just like its biryani—layered, slow-cooked, and rich with flavour, this ecosystem isn't about fast burn but lasting impact.360 One is the presenting partner of the ET Soonicorns Summit 2025. T-Hub is the ecosystem partner of the ET Soonicorns Sundowner 2025 Hyderabad edition.
Mint
5 days ago
- Mint
In rare big bet, Indian VC backs local cybersecurity firm's $70 mn fundraise
Palo Alto, US-based cybersecurity platform Safe Security has raised $70 million in a Series C round led by B2B SaaS-focused investor Avataar Venture Partners. According to Tracxn data, this is one of the largest cybersecurity deals to be led by an Indian venture capital firm. 'With the new funds, we're focused on only one thing: product, product and product," company co-founder and chief executive Saket Modi told Mint in an interview. The round, which saw other new and existing investors pin their money and faith in the company, consisted purely of primary investments and no secondaries–in other words, the money went directly to the startup and no existing shareholder sold any stake. New investors in this round included Susquehanna Asia Venture Capital, NextEquity Partners, and Prosperity7 Ventures, while existing investors Eight Roads, John Chambers and Sorenson Capital reiterated their faith in the company with more money. With this fundraise, Safe Security's overall funding has risen to $170 million. While the company's valuation is currently unknown, Modi said that it had 'more than doubled" from their last round, which was a $50-million Series B in 2023. Even back then, the company did not disclose its valuation. Incubated out of IIT Bombay in 2012, Safe Security began with a cyber risk quantification module, which still brings in about two-thirds of its revenue. The rest comes from a new module called autonomous third-party risk management, which it launched in mid-2023. 'In the next one year, I expect our first and second modules to be almost equal," said Modi, adding that a third module is being launched. The third module, according to Modi, would be an agentic artificial intelligence continuous threat exposure management (CTEM) system, which constantly evaluates, assesses and mitigates risks within an organisation's digital environment. Modi said that Safe Security will focus on this new module for the next year. 'We want to stagger it out, but whatever we build, we want to be leading in the market," Modi said. Currently, 90% of the company's revenues come from the US, the UK, and Australia. 'These geographies will continue to be where we get more customers from and we will be investing in go-to-market in these places," he said. Safe Security wants to go public but after a few years of strong growth. 'We should be in a position to be publicly traded in three to four years and when we're nearing that, we can take a strategic call on whether we want to list in India or in New York," Modi said. The company started as a services company named Lucideus but rebranded in 2018 to become product-focused, becoming Safe Security. It caters to Fortune 2,000 companies and generally signs deals that average $175,000. Some of its clients include T-Mobile, SAP, Dell, Chipotle, Canva, Chevron, HP, Google, Netflix, and British Telecom. Small India market Cybersecurity is a complex market, with companies targeting different parts of the value chain. Some that have managed to carve out moats include CrowdStrike, Palo Alto Networks–which recently acquired CyberArk for $20 billion–FortiNet and cloud security startup Whiz, which was recently acquired by Google for $32 billion. The global cybersecurity market is expected to grow from $234 billion this year to $424 billion by 2030, according to market data firm Mordor Intelligence. Comparatively, the India numbers are small and expected growth is also tepid–from $3 billion in 2025 to $3.4 billion by next year, according to technology research and advisory firm Gartner. 'Indian cybersecurity companies face challenges such as significant price sensitivity among buyers and disqualification due to missing functionality or misaligned pricing expectations," said Apeksha Kaushik, principal analyst at Gartner. 'Clients also cite underutilized existing investments and the added complexity of new solutions as key internal barriers, making it essential for vendors to demonstrate clear value." Jaspreet Singh, Milind Borate, and Ramani Kothandaraman managed to create the only cybersecurity unicorn from India, US-based cloud protection services startup Druva, which was last valued at $2 billion in 2021 after a $147 million Series H round that year. Low investor interest Even the amount of VC and PE deals happening in the sector are few. Between 2020 and 2025, only 29 deals were signed, totalling a puny $195 million, according to data from Venture Intelligence. In the past five years alone, the largest cybersecurity deal also involved Safe Security, which raised $33 million of its $50 million from JC2 Ventures in 2023. The round was led by Sorenson Capital. Even so, foreign companies like Proofpoint, which provides cybersecurity for workspaces like Office 365 and social engineering intrusions, see India as a growing market. The company sees three trends playing out here: the emergence of generative AI, creation of laws like the Digital Personal Data Protection Act and cybersecurity frameworks mandated by regulators like the RBI and finally, enterprise customers looking for more preventive platforms. As a result, the company set up an R&D and threat intelligence centre in Pune this year, hired 250 people and plans to hire more. 'We see India not as an R&D and GCC geography, but as a full-fledged market," said Proofpoint CEO Sumit Dhawan. Currently, most of the company's business comes from the US, which accounts for 72% of its business, with the remaining 28% coming from Western Europe and Australia. Proofpoint is currently in conversation with 50 Indian enterprises. Dhawan said the company has already signed up two of the country's largest BPOs, but declined to name them. 'In my assessment, for the India business to be at par with western Europe, it'll take between 18-24 months," said Dhawan.
