Among the greatest concerns plaguing the progress of Indian AI is the cost of developing AI products and limited access to computing infrastructure. The IndiaAI Mission has secured and allotted 62,000 GPUs to date, however, their utilisation remains marginal.
At the Women Entrepreneurs’ Mixer organised by the Department of Electronics, IT and Biotechnology ahead of the 29th Bengaluru Tech Summit, Priyanka Gangishetty, Co-founder of Vuha AI, which builds industrial smart cameras and AI cameras, raised the issue of access to computing resources in such a capital-intensive and research-heavy business. She asked whether the government could provide subsidised GPUs, hardware, or facilities where startups could train their AI models.
“I think anybody that’s in the AI space needs a lot of compute GPUs,” Gangishetty said, asking whether startups could access GPUs at a more subsidised rate than what was currently available.
Government officials said they would examine proposals for subsidised computing and shared facilities.
Prof Debabrata Das, associated with the proposed ₹35 crore AI Hub at IIIT-Bangalore, acknowledged the pressure on hardware costs, particularly memory and GPUs. He said hardware costs had risen roughly four times in the past year and that the IndiaAI Mission provides computing through its own channel, not through the state government.
He said Karnataka already provides capital expenditure support to hardware companies through its electronics system design and manufacturing (ESDM) and startup support schemes. According to the Karnataka Digital Economy Mission (KDEM), Karnataka accounts for roughly 10% of India’s electronic output and 64% of ESDM exports.
Das also said the AI Hub is planning an ‘AI Living Lab’ where startups could book slots to access computing resources and test their solutions. He cautioned that computing capacity and memory availability were global constraints and could remain so for another year and a half.
Responding to Gangishetty’s request, Dr Manjula N, IAS Secretary of Electronics, ITBT and S&T in the Karnataka government, asked Das to examine whether the state could provide further compute subsidies through the proposed facility.
A founder working in robotics and manufacturing also asked the government to consider shared facilities where startups could access manufacturing space and equipment without establishing their own infrastructure.
Taslimarif Saiyed, CEO of Centre for Cellular and Molecular Platforms, also highlighted the physical AI capabilities provided at non-profit ARTPARK, hosted at the Indian Institute of Science, and datasets available through government-supported centres of excellence that startups could use to test their models.
Dr Manjula said the state was preparing a policy to make government data available to companies based on their requirements. She said the policy would build a mechanism so that “the data which is there in the government may be made available” as needed.
From Grants to Customers
Access to computing is only one part of the challenge. Women founders also raised concerns about the difficulty of moving from early-stage grants to commercial growth, particularly when their products require years of research and development before they are ready for deployment.
Sanjeev Kumar Gupta, CEO of KDEM, said the organisation could help connect women-led startups with manufacturing companies, global capability centres (GCCs), and large enterprises. He also highlighted the Government First initiative, which provides pilot support of up to ₹25 lakh for startups to validate solutions through government departments.
Karnataka has several programmes supporting women-led businesses, like WEscalate, which focuses on accelerating women-led startups, and BioWise, which supports biotechnology ventures. The ELEVATE programme also provides grant assistance to startups developing products and solutions.
Under ELEVATE Shakti 2026, 63 women-led startups were selected, with grant support of ₹23.19 crore committed, according to the department. The broader ELEVATE Grant-in-Aid Programme has supported more than 400 women-led startups since 2017, with committed assistance of ₹118.98 crore.
Extending Support Beyond Bengaluru
The discussion also brought attention to the differences in infrastructure and ecosystem access between Bengaluru and other parts of Karnataka.
Dr Manjula said the government had identified 11 technology business incubators outside Bengaluru, many of them operating through engineering colleges and academic institutions. She said building the startup ecosystem outside Bengaluru is challenging because Bengaluru already has much of the support in place, and that the state is building it up gradually through Centres of Excellence and regional incubators.
The state is also setting up 50 AI learning labs in government colleges across tier-2 and tier-3 cities.
She said recent measures include a faculty development programme for women faculty from engineering colleges and bootcamps for girl students, both run through a Cybersecurity Centre of Excellence at the Indian Institute of Science.
KDEM has also been organising technology events that bring industry leaders to cities outside Bengaluru, such as Mysuru, Mangaluru and Belagavi- Hubballi Cluster, to showcase the talent and skills available there.