India AI Impact Summit 2026 Showcases Women-Led AI for Public Good and Digital Public Infrastructure
The India AI Impact Summit 2026 spotlighted the growing role of women-led innovation in shaping inclusive and responsible artificial intelligence through the AI By HER Global Impact Challenge, a flagship programme focused on AI for public good and Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI).
The day-long programme convened women innovators, founders, researchers, policymakers and ecosystem leaders to explore how impact-first AI solutions can address real-world challenges across healthcare, sustainability, security, education and public infrastructure. Through panel discussions, expert conversations and startup showcases, the event underscored how empathy-driven design, trust and long-term vision can translate into measurable societal outcomes.
Empathy-driven innovation and early problem solving
The opening panel, “Her First Algorithm: India’s Next Breakthrough,” highlighted how innovation often begins with lived experience and curiosity. Moderated by Deepali Upadhyay of the Atal Innovation Mission, the session featured young innovators from Nagarjuna Model School (Andhra Pradesh), Dell Public School (Greater Faridabad) and Adarsh Public School (Delhi). Students demonstrated AI solutions addressing artisan livelihoods, grain storage inefficiencies and chronic health conditions, while emphasising the role of national innovation initiatives in nurturing problem-solving skills from school to startup level.
Translating research into scalable solutions
In the panel “From Lab to Lives: Turning Innovation into Impact,” experts stressed the need to move research-driven innovation into deployable solutions. Moderating the discussion, Meghna Bal of the Esya Centre led conversations with leaders from academia, venture capital and product innovation. Panelists highlighted responsible data use, sector-specific design and the importance of leveraging India’s DPI stack to enable scalable, trusted solutions across healthcare, agriculture and fintech.
Women founders redefining startup leadership
The session “Rewriting the Startup Playbook: Not Despite. Because of HER.” explored how women founders are building resilient businesses through clarity, preparation and disciplined execution. Moderated by Rahul Matthan of Trilegal, the panel featured Kanika Tekriwal of JetSetGo Aviation Services, Rucha Nanavati of Mahindra & Mahindra and Sarita Ahlawat of BotLab Dynamics. Speakers noted that strong networks, consistent effort and strategic adaptability are helping women-led ventures scale across complex sectors.
Building infrastructure-level AI solutions
Another session, “Building Things to Transform: Breaking the Mould,” examined the need to build infrastructure-level AI solutions addressing systemic gaps. Moderated by Debjani Ghosh of NITI Aayog, panelists discussed ecosystem collaboration, long-term conviction and translating deep technologies into sustainable business models.
Women-led startups showcase AI innovation
Startup Spotlight sessions featured rapid-fire pitches from women-led ventures working across diverse domains. Highlights included Cognitii’s AI-enabled special-needs learning platform; Cellverse’s AI-validated 3D bioprinted disease models; Secure Blink’s AI-driven cybersecurity platform; Cratic AI’s multilingual factory-floor co-worker; Baeru’s waste intelligence system for marine plastic recovery; and RoshniAI’s voice-first learning companion delivering local-language education.
Other innovations included Arghyam’s AI-enabled water governance initiatives, Trupreneurs.ai’s K–12 entrepreneurship platform, AquaAirX’s autonomous decision-making systems, and ClipreAI’s climate intelligence platform proposing a National Climate Intelligence System for real-time resilience planning.
Strengthening ecosystem support for women founders
The summit concluded with a session on enabling women entrepreneurs led by Anna Roy, Mission Director of the Women Entrepreneurship Platform. She outlined WEP’s role in building an end-to-end support ecosystem—from aspiration to scale—and announced a capacity-building programme for 150 shortlisted women-led AI startups, offering mentorship and networking support.
“Our vision at WEP is empowerment—Shakti—where we enable behaviour change, provide access to the right knowledge at the right time, and support women entrepreneurs from aspiration through scaling their enterprises,” Roy said.
She also announced the Top 10 winners of the AI By HER Global Impact Challenge: Able Credit, Aso AI, Power Lifeline, Veryfi Technologies, Project Drives, Prosigo Language, Videos HR, That Creating, Water Ultra AR and Zico AR.
The programme reinforced the growing momentum of women-led AI innovation in India, highlighting its potential to build inclusive digital infrastructure and deliver scalable solutions for societal good.
