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Gnani.ai has raised $10 million to build sovereign AI voice agents and expand its enterprise AI offerings. The funding highlights growing demand for secure, scalable voice technology solutions in the AI landscape.
It was one of the very few startups selected under the IndiaAI Mission to build a 14 Bn parameter voice AI foundational model to offer multilingual and real-time speech processing with advanced reasoning capabilities.
Generative AI (GenAI) startup Gnani.ai has raised $10 Mn (around Rs. 94 Cr) in its Series B funding round led by Aavishkaar Capital. The round also saw participation from existing backer InfoEdge Ventures.
“Deep-tech is no longer a niche; it is becoming central to solving the defining challenges of our time,” said Shilpa Maheshwari, Managing Director at Aavishkaar Capital.
She added that India’s linguistic diversity played a key role in the investment thesis. "With the multilingual capability that Gnani has, it was a turning point for us," Maheshwari told Business Today, noting that deploying sovereign AI models at scale for underserved populations aligns with what she described as “True Bharat.”
The startup will deploy the fresh capital to expand its customer base by exploring new verticals and global markets. Additionally, a portion of the funds will go towards research and development and talent acquisition.
Gnani.ai cofounder Gopalan said, “Gnani is adequately funded. We are a deep-tech company where almost every element of the pipeline is built in-house, which gives us strong gross margins."
The company said it is maintaining financial discipline. “We were EBITDA profitable in FY25, and this funding will help us accelerate growth as enterprise AI adoption increases."
"Voice is the most natural form of human communication, and human-machine interaction will follow the same path. We are building a voice-to-voice LLM that removes intermediate layers like speech-to-text and text-to-speech, improving latency, emotion capture, and accuracy," Gopalan said.
Founded in 2016 by Ganesh Gopalan and Ananth Nagaraj, Gnani.ai launched its voice-first AI model, Inya, at the India Impact AI Summit 2026.
Gnani.ai’s B2B agentic AI solutions improve the customer experience for large enterprises and customer-facing businesses across the BFSI, telecommunications, e-commerce, and healthcare sectors.
“We recently launched Vachna TTS (text-to-speech) that can voice clone a person in six seconds and also give you the ability to speak in multiple languages. Even if you just train it in one language. So, this is one example of some of the newer products that we are building,” the cofounder said.
Inya allows enterprises to build, deploy, and manage AI agents across voice and digital channels. As per Gopalan, Inya has already roped in more than 150 customers.
Gnani.ai reported strong financial performance in FY25, with revenue more than doubling to Rs 53.87 crore from Rs 23.09 crore a year earlier. The company reported a net profit of Rs. 3.19 crore and a loss of Rs. 51 lakh in FY24.
He added that performance benchmarks support the company’s approach. "I can show you multiple benchmarks where we are performing far better than (global companies) across various Indic and other languages. The real wars are going to be how you make a true business or government impact. You need to understand the customer domain."
The Indian AI market is projected to become a $126 Bn opportunity by 2030 and is expected to contribute up to $1.7 Tn to the country’s GDP by 2035.
The funding event comes amid growing investor interest in the domestic AI sector. It is driven largely by increasing adoption of AI tools, advances in machine learning, and generative AI.
Gopalan highlighted the importance of localized AI development. "We are here building sovereign AI. This is the true Swaraj," he said.
