Gnani.ai raises $10 million from Aavishkaar Capital to scale voice AI models globally

Gnani ai raises $10 million from Aavishkaar Capital to scale voice AI models globally

Gnani.ai raised $10 million from Aavishkaar Capital to expand internationally and enhance R&D. The Bengaluru-based firm processes 30 million daily voice interactions in 12+ languages, serving over 200 enterprises, including Fortune 500 companies. Gnani.ai develops its entire AI stack in-house, including speech-to-text (STT), text-to-speech (TTS), and a proprietary speech-to-speech model, along with its agentic AI platform. Voice AI startup Gnani.ai has raised $10 million in a funding round led by impact investor Aavishkaar Capital, as the company looks to expand its business internationally and improve its R&D capabilities. Founded by Ganesh Gopalan and Ananth Nagaraj, the Bengaluru-based company builds voice-first, agentic AI platforms that help enterprises automate customer interactions across languages. The startup said it currently processes over 30 million voice interactions daily in more than 12 languages and serves over 200 enterprise customers, including Fortune 500 companies. "Customers are seeing tangible improvements in efficiency and performance," cofounder Ganesh Gopalan told ET. He added that in the last financial year, the company added over 100 new enterprises and expects to grow faster over the next couple of years. Gnani.ai develops its entire AI stack in-house, including speech-to-text (STT), text-to-speech (TTS), and a proprietary speech-to-speech model, along with its agentic AI platform. The company's portfolio spans use cases such as workforce automation, live agent assist, voice biometrics, and call intelligence across sectors such as BFSI, telecom, insurance, automotive, and government, it said in a statement. Gnani already serves markets such as the US, Japan, the Middle East, and parts of East Asia. Broad opportunity On how voice AI integrates into enterprise workflows beyond customer support, Gopalan said the opportunity is much broader. "For example, in lending, we work across the entire lifecycle, from customer acquisition and onboarding to underwriting, engagement, cross-sell, and collections. Similarly, in sectors like automotive or travel, we help drive revenue, whether it's selling cars or increasing hotel bookings." The cofounder added that voice AI becomes a core layer across business workflows, not just a front-end interface. The startup is also working on new products such as avatar-based interfaces and voice cloning. Gnani.ai counts Samsung Ventures and Info Edge Ventures among its existing backers and is one of the companies selected under the government's India AI Mission to build sovereign foundational AI models. Investor perspective The fundraise comes as enterprises increasingly adopt AI-led automation tools, with voice emerging as a key interface in multilingual markets such as India and other emerging economies. "Deeptech, especially AI, has become impossible to ignore -- it is now central to how economies grow and scale," said Shilpa Maheshwari, managing director, Aavishkaar Capital. "We see deeptech as a structural growth engine for India, and that is why we have been tracking the space closely. Gnani.ai fits well within that thesis," Maheshwari added that the firm will continue to evaluate AI actively, but always through an impact lens. "Today, many companies position themselves as AI-led, so the challenge is identifying those with real technological depth versus superficial positioning. That makes diligence in this space more complex," she said.

Gnani.ai Raises $10 Mn from Aavishkaar Capital to Power Next-Gen AI Voice Agents

"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 . 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. 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."