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The product ecosystem in India is evolving rapidly, and the utilisation of deep tech has helped startups make world-class products and scale up rapidly. Apart from creating job opportunities in the short term and wealth opportunities in the long term, these startups have also begun to build products that have the potential to take over the global markets, thus driving the vision of Made In India.

According to NASSCOM’s startup report titled Indian Tech Startup Ecosystem: Year of the Titans, more than 2,250 new tech startups were added to the ecosystem in 2021, a 40 percent growth in companies as compared to the previous year that took the total base to 25,000-26,000. The report also showed that more than 300 new deep tech startups joined the ecosystem in 2021, and 11 tech IPOs came out, which broke the record for the most tech IPOs in a year.

The startup ecosystem has also seen a considerable acceleration in the number of scaleups with revenues exceeding $15 million in the last 10 years. Emerging industries like D2C, edtech, logistics, and automotive also saw new scaleups which shows how much ground has been covered by the startup ecosystem in the country.

Celebrating excellence

Almost every business existing in the ecosystem is looking to adopt digital platforms and products, cloud adoption is growing at an unprecedented rate, which places an emphasis on cloud management, vertical solutions, modernisation of applications and more.

This has enabled Indian product companies to focus on more than just domestic markets and provide solutions and services to the global markets as well. Ramkumar Narayanan, VP Technology & MD, VMware Software India Pvt. Ltd., Chair – NASSCOM Product Council says, “The last couple of years has pushed the need for hyper digitalization and contactless operating models. This has led to technology innovation at an unprecedented scale. The demand for software products and the need for newer ones has grown to an all-time high. We are also witnessing growing interest from global and Indian investors with multi-billion-dollar investments received by Indian product companies. The opportunities are huge and the entire world today has opened up as a marketplace for Indian software products companies with SaaS and subscription-based offerings – achieving the vision of 10X growth by 2025.”

The Emerge 50 Awards, India’s most prestigious and prominent awards in the software product industry, has stayed true to its mission to find and recognise the most innovative software product from emerging companies and provide them with the guidance to move forward.

These awards have helped in identifying the right pool of companies that have constantly matured since their nominations. Having recognised 575 products across 550 companies since 2009, Emerge 50 has positioned itself as the frontrunner to help the product ecosystem evolve. Since 2009, more than 92 Emerge 50 winners have made successful exits, 83 of which have been acquired.

Over the years, Emerge 50 winners have raised over $4.2 billion in equity funding, and a recent analysis of these companies shows that more than 284 companies are funded, over 145 companies are seed/angel-funded, 102 companies have placed themselves in Series A and B, and about 30 companies have become a part of Series C and above.

The awards have offered several brands across the country an opportunity to join the exclusive club of India’s most successful enterprises and receive global recognition for their innovative excellence. These awards also give brands industry-wide media exposure, along with access to CXOs, business connect meetings, and an opportunity to participate in trade delegations.

What was on offer this year?

The 2021 edition of the awards celebrated the emerging software product companies as always, while also ensuring that these companies rule the industry in coming times. The event invited all Indian software product companies with commercial products, paying customers and a revenue of not more than Rs 100 crore to apply for the awards.

The jury for the awards comprised of Asha Impact’s Principal Aditi Gupta, Tata Communications’ Head of IoT BU Alok Bardiya, Indifi’s Co-founder and CEO Alok Mittal, JioGenNext’s Head Amey Mashelkar, Omidyar Network India’s Director Amol Warange, and more. The awards covered innovative products pertaining to verticals like FinTech, HealthTech, RetailTech, Logistics and Supply Chain, SaaS, Enterprise, Bharat, IoT Hardware & Devices, Strategic Sector & Cybersecurity.

While the awards celebrated the innovative excellence of the top 50 software product companies in the country, the top 10 companies entered an elite category called the League of 10. The products that have entered the NASSCOM’s League of 10 this year’s edition are no different from all the products in the past that have made a difference. Here are the platforms/products that made it to the League of 10 this year:

• Koo: Developed by Bombinate Technologies Private Limited, Koo is a micro-blogging platform that enables the expression of thoughts and opinions in multiple languages. and helps in enabling local language communities.
• AccuKnox: Created by AccuKnox, this product is a zero-trust Security platform that protects networks, applications and data. It also delivers micro-segmentation, data security, data governance, data provenance and continuous compliance dashboards.
• CloudHedge App Modernisation Platform: This product, developed by CloudHedge Technologies, is a patented and automated app modernization platform that modernises legacy applications and creates a well-defined path for enterprises to leverage cloud services.
• Credgenics SaaS-based Collections: This product, which has been built by Credgenics, is an end-to-end SaaS-based debt recovery solution provider where debt is recovered through an automated communication model and litigation handled by the platform’s in-house panel of lawyers.
• Healthplix EMR Solutions: Developed by Heathplix Technologies Private Limited, this product is an AI-first EMR platform that provides analytics and insights to ensure higher productivity and faster decision making, and is used by doctors to solve problems by diagnosing and treating patients using assistive and tech-first tools.
• Traffic Monitoring Imaging Radar: Steradian Semiconductors Private Limited’s all integrated unit is used for applications like traffic monitoring and enforcement to save lives on the road, which also has the potential to improve parking efficiency and bring the power of radar to consumer products as well.
• Pazo: This mobile-first operations and compliance management platform, developed by Pazo Innovations Private Limited, enables brands to get full visibility on all daily operations done across all stores, and ensures that head offices get a bird’s eye view of everything.
• Lyfsize: Created by the thinktank at BigThinx, this AI software carries out a 3D human body scan using only two photos from a smartphone and instantly calculates full-body precise measurements. These measurements match any shopper to their accurate size in any clothing brand, reducing apparel returns by 70%, increasing order values by 20% and conversions by 250%.
• CometChat: This product, built by CometChat, quickly and easily delivers text, chat, voice, and video engagement functionality through easy-to-use SDKs, APIs, and UI kits, which helps developers save time and achieve better results by integrating the product into their applications.
• Unmanned Marine Surface Vehicle: Developed by Sagar Defence Engineering Private Limited, this product works closely with human operators by utilising levels of managed autonomy, thus helping operators focus on the work at hand rather than directly navigating unmanned vessels.

More such encouragement needs to be given to emerging product companies, as such awards hold the power to accelerate the product ecosystem in India by empowering and encouraging upcoming tech startups to build products that can be disruptive for the industry across verticals.