MeitY Startup Hub: The Government's Gateway to Startup Capital and Grants

An initiative of the Ministry of Electronics & IT founded in 2019, MeitY Startup Hub connects startups with incubators, investors and mentors — and runs equity-free grant programmes with Google, Meta and Greenko-style partners.

MeitY Startup Hub (MSH) is a national startup platform launched by the Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (MeitY), Government of India, in 2019 and headquartered in New Delhi. It functions as a national connector between startups and incubators, accelerators, investors, industry players, mentors and academic institutions — with a particular mandate to strengthen India's DeepTech ecosystem from ideation to scale. The platform is led by CEO Jeej Vijay, per the official site.

Equity-free grants and flagship programmes

MSH's biggest draw for founders is non-dilutive capital. Its GENESIS Entrepreneur-in-Residence (EIR) 3.0, launched at the GENESIS NextGen Startup Summit in Coimbatore in August 2026, offers up to Rs 10 lakh in funding plus incubation support to students, innovators, researchers and early-stage founders — with a deliberate focus on Tier-II and Tier-III cities and emerging areas like AI/ML, semiconductors and VLSI, cybersecurity, blockchain and quantum.

The XR Startup Program, launched with Meta in September 2022, nurtured 40 early-stage XR startups with grants of Rs 20 lakh each plus mentorship; its Grand Challenge took 80 innovators through a bootcamp and awarded Rs 20 lakh grants to 16 of them to build MVPs. Appscale Academy, run with Google, trained 100 startups over six months on UX design, business models, monetisation, international expansion and data safety, with select startups pitching to leading VCs.

Ecosystem role

MSH also stages national showcases: at Startup Mahakhumbh 2024 (Bharat Mandapam, New Delhi) its MeitY Pavilion featured 40+ startups connecting with investors and industry experts. As a government initiative, fund size is not applicable — its value to founders lies in grants, mentorship, market access and investor introductions rather than equity investment.

Both programmes draw marquee names. Appscale Academy alumni-style cohorts have included well-known consumer apps such as Jar, MediBuddy, Kutuki, iMumz, AyuRythm and Sri Mandir — showing MSH's reach spans edtech, health, fintech and devotional tech alike. The XR Startup Program was implemented through institutional partners including CIE at IIIT Hyderabad, AIC-SMUTBI, GUSEC and FITT at IIT Delhi, giving startups genuine lab and mentor access. Data providers such as PitchBook list MSH as an actively investing accelerator/incubator headquartered in New Delhi and founded in 2019.

Why it matters for founders

Before you give away equity, check what MSH is offering. Its programmes — especially GENESIS EIR for Tier-II/III founders and the Meta XR grants — are equity-free money paired with institutional mentorship. Government programmes move slowly, but they do not dilute you, and an MSH grant on your cap table reads well with later investors.