India's Deep Tech Startup Policy Nearing Completion, Says DPIIT Secretary: All About It

The Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) secretary, RK Singh, announced on Monday (18 March) that India's national deeptech startup policy is in its final stages of inter-ministerial consultations.

Speaking at the Startup Mahakumbh event, Singh mentioned the importance of startups' ability to commercialize and develop intellectual property rights (IPR).

“The Government of India is in the process of creating a separate dedicated deep tech startup policy,” Singh said at the inaugural event of ‘Startup Mahakumbh’.

He further added that the “policy paper is in the final stages of inter-ministerial discussion.”

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“We hope to bring it forward soon,” DPIIT secretary said.

The upcoming policy aims to support these startups and create a conducive ecosystem for their growth.

Debjani Ghosh, president of Nasscom, said, “Think of deeptech as the key required to unlock the accelerated growth potential of India. The ecosystem which is going to unlock that key is the startup economy.”

Amitabh Kant, India's G20 sherpa, echoed similar sentiment, stressing the need for a significant deeptech fund of funds to support these startups.

“We will need a big deeptech fund of funds, which will deploy resources into alternate investment funds (AIFs), because much of the startup movement's success story has been because we were able to create the fund of funds,” he said.

On regulations, Kant said, “All of you entrepreneurs are innovators. As you grow and expand, you must ensure that there is proper financial management and a proper audit. Self-regulation is the key."

Earlier, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had announced in the union budget 2024 the launch of a new scheme to strengthen deeptech technologies for defense purposes and expediting ‘aatmanirbharta’ or self-reliance.

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