Nova Spectral AI raises Rs 21.15 crore seed led by Shastra VC for quantum-dot infrared sensor chips

TLDR

• Bengaluru's Nova Spectral AI raised Rs 21.15 crore (about $2.25M) in a seed round led by Shastra VC.¹
• It is building infrared image sensor chips from quantum dots; defence surveillance is its first market, the company says.²
• The money funds a team and a prototype within 18 months; no customer is named.¹²

Nova Spectral AI, a Bengaluru deeptech start-up, raised Rs 21.15 crore (about $2.25 million) in a seed round, Entrackr reports.¹ Shastra VC led, with Equirus InnovateX Fund and angel investors taking part.¹ Indian Startup News says the company was founded in May 2026 by Anish Priyadarshi and Sanjeev Kumar.² The sources do not say whether any participant had backed the company before, and they do not name the angels.

The company is developing short wave infrared (SWIR) image sensor chips. Indian Startup News explains that SWIR cameras can capture images in low light, haze, smoke and dust, which makes them useful for drones, surveillance systems, robots and autonomous vehicles.² Most SWIR sensors today use indium gallium arsenide, which that report calls expensive and complex to make.² Nova Spectral instead deposits lead-free indium arsenide colloidal quantum dots on standard silicon CMOS chips and aims to cut sensor costs by up to 100 times.² That is the company's target; the sources show no test data and no working prototype. Inc42 says Priyadarshi, an IIT Kanpur alumnus, has built a quantum dot fabrication facility and developed working indium arsenide sensors for SWIR imaging, and that the company has in-principle approval to incubate at IISc Bengaluru.³

Defence is the stated first market. According to the start-up, as relayed by Indian Startup News, that means intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) platforms and drones, where cheaper sensors could widen the use of SWIR imaging and reduce dependence on imports.²¹ Priyadarshi told Inc42: "India's armed forces should not have to rely on an imported sensor to see at night or through smoke."³ No source names a defence customer, contract or trial. The funding is for hiring and a field-ready prototype within 18 months, so this is an early bet on a component rather than a fielded product.¹² Entrackr notes another Indian start-up in the space, SpectraGaze Systems, which raised Rs 3.7 crore in a seed round led by GVFL for indigenous infrared detectors, optical imaging sensors and electro-optical payloads for space and defence.¹

On the lead investor, Inc42 reported on 21 May 2026 that Shastra VC, founded in 2022 by Vasant Rao, Avijeet Alagathi and Ashis Nayak, had launched a third fund of $100 million focused on space and defence technologies, AI and renewable sciences, writing cheques of $500,000 to $3 million.⁴ The firm claims to have deployed about $55 million across its first two funds in 30 start-ups, with portfolio names including Alt Carbon, Simplismart, Sisir Radar, Avammune and Sanlayan.⁴ The closest to this field is Sisir Radar. Shastra says Sisir raised a $7 million Series A led by 360 ONE Asset in December 2025, with continued Shastra participation, to build what Shastra calls India's first private L-band synthetic aperture radar satellite; the company was founded by Dr Tapan Misra, a former director of ISRO's Space Applications Centre.⁵ The sources do not say whether the Nova Spectral cheque came from the new third fund.

Why it matters: an investor with a stated space and defence mandate is funding an infrared-sensing component start-up before it has a prototype or a named buyer, a sign that domestic sensors are being treated as a gap worth backing.²⁴ Watch whether the 18-month prototype draws a defence trial or order.