Entrepreneur Navya Naveli Nanda:

Navya Naveli Nanda’s venture to back deeptech, frontier tech ambitions

Navya Naveli Nanda’s Naveli Ventures plans to invest in deep-tech, space, AI, clean energy and other emerging sectors as India expands support for technology-led innovation.

रुचिका सिंह/ Business Journalist/ DAILY INDIATIMES

Entrepreneur Navya Naveli Nanda formally introduced Naveli Ventures, a venture arm of the Nanda Family Office, with a focus on startups and research-led opportunities across deep-tech, space, clean energy, artificial intelligence, advanced manufacturing and health.

In a LinkedIn announcement, Nanda noted the platform would invest through direct startup investments, institutional funds, co-investments and academic and intellectual-property partnerships.

We define ourselves not by sector but by the scale of the problem and the conviction of those solving it,” she wrote. She also said the family office’s relationships across industry, government, academia and the investor community could be used to support its partners.

Naveli Ventures LLP was incorporated in March 2023, with Nanda and Agastya Nanda as designated partners. Today’s announcement is principally the formal unveiling of an investment strategy. The family office is associated with the Nanda business group, including Escorts Kubota, the farm and construction-equipment company.

The development arrives as India is putting more public capital behind commercially difficult technologies. The government’s Research, Development and Innovation scheme has a planned corpus of Rs 1 lakh crore over six years, with deep-tech, AI, biotechnology, energy transition and space among its priority areas. Startup India Fund of Funds 2.0, notified in April 2026, adds a Rs 10,000 crore pool aimed partly at deeptech and technology-driven manufacturing.

Private capital is moving in the same direction, although unevenly. Capital-A closed the first close of a Rs 160 crore second fund in April, targeting manufacturing and deep-tech startups, while Bluehill.VC closed a Rs 400 crore frontier-tech fund in August.

Last month, IIT Madras, IIT Madras Research Park, and Unicorn India Ventures announced a Rs 450 crore first close for the IITM Unicorn Frontier Fund I, part of a planned Rs 1,000 crore deeptech fund.

Naveli’s promise of patient capital is timely but not unique.

“We are not chasing quick returns but looking to help build enduring companies alongside exceptional people for India’s future,” Nanda wrote. The harder question will be whether that long-term approach can help technologies move from research and prototypes to durable, scalable businesses