ET Startup Awards 2026: Groww adjudged No. 1; Sauce VC’s Manu Chandra named Midas Touch winner

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SynopsisThe elite jury was chaired by Wipro executive chairman Rishad Premji. The 11-member panel deliberated for nearly three hours on Tuesday to pick winners in eight categories.

AgenciesETSA jury was particularly delighted with the growing presence of unconventional deeptech ventures aiming to solve global problemsWealthtech platform Groww won the coveted Startup of the Year at the 12th edition of The Economic Times Startup Awards, beating back a stiff challenge from other pioneers Meesho, Skyroot, Porter, Rapido and Sarvam.

The elite jury, chaired by Wipro executive chairman Rishad Premji, picked Manu Chandra, founder and managing partner at consumer-focused investment firm Sauce VC, for the high-profile Midas Touch award.

The Woman Ahead category saw joint winners for the first time, with the jury picking both Pallavi Mohadikar, cofounder and chief executive of Palmonas, and Progcap cofounder and CEO Pallavi Shrivastava, after intense debate.

The 11-member jury deliberated for nearly three hours on Tuesday to pick winners in eight categories. Online yoga platform Habuild was this year’s Bootstrap Champ; cleantech startup Varaha bagged the Social Enterprise award; Mukund Jha was named Comeback Kid; deeptech startup Theranautilus was adjudged winner in the Top Innovator category; and Best on Campus award was won by Armatrix.

Founded by Lalit Keshre, Harsh Jain, Ishan Bansal and Neeraj Singh in 2016, the publicly listed Groww joins an exclusive club of winners of the top prize that includes Urban Company, Lenskart, Zomato (now Eternal), Delhivery, Razorpay, OfBusiness and Swiggy.

Besides Groww, six previous winners of the Startup of the Year prize — Urban Company, Zomato, Delhivery, Freshworks, Lenskart and Swiggy — are now listed on the exchanges, showcasing the award’s ability to spot blue-chip enterprises well before they bloom.

Premji was joined on the jury by Sachin Bansal, cofounder, Flipkart and Navi; Vijay Shekhar Sharma, founder and chief executive, Paytm; Mukesh Bansal, cofounder, Myntra and Curefit; Mithun Sacheti, cofounder, CaratLane; Nandita Sinha, CEO, Swiggy Instamart; Ajit Mohan, chief business officer, Snap Inc; Irina Ghose, managing director, Anthropic India; Paras Chopra, founder, Wingify and Lossfunk; Abhiraj Singh Bhal, cofounder and chief executive, Urban Company; and Aryaman Vikram Birla, director, Aditya Birla Group.

The diverse jury recognised Groww’s scale, profitability and accelerating growth to emerge as India’s biggest stockbroking and investment platform. Jurors underscored how the Bengaluru-headquartered company has built a large business in an intensely competitive industry that is also highly regulated.

The jury extensively debated Meesho and Skyroot before picking Groww in a secret electronic vote. The outcome of that debate was a fine balance that recognised technology buildout and, at the same time, the ability to scale up while being profitable, one of the jurors said.

Chandra won the coveted Midas Touch award for his early and high-conviction bets on consumer brands that have resulted in multiple cash exits. This includes an 8-10x return on exiting skincare brand Innovist when it was acquired by French beauty major L’Oréal in June.

“The discussions were very rich and open. There were such diverse points of views… and I was more than surprised with the quality of discussion and openness,” said Premji after the jury meeting. “I think startups have matured significantly over the years. The opportunity for them to think longer term and raise long-term capital to address some of the most challenging problems in the country and the world is incredible to see. They are really maturing.”

Habuild won this year’s Bootstrap Champ prize, with the jury highlighting its sustainable scaling — achieved over the years without burning capital on marketing and customer acquisition. Started as an attempt to make yoga more accessible to the masses, Habuild has grown into one of India’s largest digital wellness platforms, without raising any external capital.

The Woman Ahead contest was a tie between two entrepreneurs. Mohadikar won the jury’s nod for scaling up a demi-fine jewellery brand in a space that is still largely untapped, while Shrivastava was appreciated for building a sustainable supply chain financing business in an industry that is complex from a regulatory as well as competitive perspective.

Varaha won the Social Enterprise award for its ‘double bottomline’ focus — building a business model while contributing to the resolution of a key climate change issue, reducing carbon dioxide levels, by working with small farmers.

Mukund Jha was named Comeback Kid this year for his second act — after the scars of Dunzo’s high-profile failure faded — at Emergent, as the jury recognised that his bold bet on artificial intelligence on the global stage stood out.

Deeptech startup Theranautilus was adjudged the winner in the Top Innovator category for its work on microscopic robots that can navigate inside the human body to perform targeted, minimally invasive treatments.