T-Hub has launched Flashpoint, a venture studio designed to help founders build startups around industry-validated problems from the early stages. The programme brings together T-Hub, industry partners and selected founders to develop new companies around identified market needs.
Under Flashpoint, founders will receive operator-led mentorship and access to infrastructure such as laboratories, testbeds and existing supply chains. T-Hub will also connect startups with its network of investors, mentors and resource partners to support their development and first fundraising round.
The programme is designed to allow founders to retain 100% ownership of their startups without equity dilution from T-Hub. The venture studio aims to reduce the time founders typically spend identifying problems, accessing industry expertise and validating market demand before starting product development.
Applications are now open for the first agri-tech and space-tech tracks, being developed with Kheyti and Dhruva Space respectively. T-Hub said the initiative builds on its experience of supporting more than 3,300 startups.
As part of Flashpoint, T-Hub will work with category-leading companies across multiple tracks. The program launches with agri-tech and space-tech. Flashpoint has partnered with Kheyti, an Earthshot Prize-winning agri-tech company building climate-resilient farming solutions with smallholder farmers, and Dhruva Space, a space infrastructure provider offering satellites, mission-critical subsystems, launch facilitation, ground segment solutions, and capacity building. T-Hub invites operators and industry partners to build in many more tracks across sectors at the studio.
Founders selected for the agri-tech track will join Kheyti as Entrepreneurs-in-Residence, with a ₹1 lakh monthly stipend, sponsored pilots, and direct work with 8,000 greenhouse farmers from week one. For the space-tech track, Dhruva Space will provide founders with access to its end-to-end Space engineering infrastructure, including cleanrooms, thermal-vacuum and vibration testing facilities, and ground stations, enabling them to develop, test, and validate their technologies from day zero. Applications are now open for both tracks through T-Hub’s website.
Commenting on the development, Kavikrut, CEO, T-Hub, said, “Flashpoint offers founders something genuinely valuable – an industry-validated problem to solve, an experienced operator to build it with, and access to resources and network of T-Hub. If you have the entrepreneurial bug and the passion to build something meaningful, but don’t know where to start, this is the right program for you.”
Speaking on the agri-tech track, Kaushik Kappagantulu, Co-Founder and CEO, Kheyti, said, “This is a full-circle moment for us. Kheyti started at T-Hub. We were among the first teams allocated space at the T-Hub campus at IIIT Hyderabad in 2015, and we were there when Mr. Ratan Tata inaugurated it. Ten years on, we are back at T-Hub as the partner, helping the next generation of agritech founders start where we started, and further our vision of making every smallholder farmer in India climate smart.”
Adding to this on the space-tech track, Sanjay Nekkanti, Co-Founder & CEO, Dhruva Space, said, “As India expands its presence in Space, the requirements for indigenous technology will grow across every part of the value chain. The opportunity is to build more satellites or launch systems, and also to develop the components, subsystems, software, data and services that will support a much larger Space economy. India has a deep pool of business, engineering and technical talent that can build these capabilities here and take them to global markets. The planned Bharatiya Antariksh Space Station will also create an entirely new environment for innovation, with opportunities for companies to develop technologies for in-orbit operations, servicing, research and other applications. Through Flashpoint, Dhruva Space is very excited to help founders take on these opportunities early, giving them access to the infrastructure, expertise and real-world environments they need to build and scale.”
The venture studio builds on T-Hub’s recent launch of Blueprint, a 12-month fellowship in which T-Hub works as a generalist CXO to deep tech startups, taking them from early traction to scale. Flashpoint extends that same co-building model to the very start of a founder’s journey, before the company is formed. T-Hub remains committed to building with founders and creating pathways to capital, customers, and markets they need to scale from Hyderabad and India to the world.