Newsletter
Deepinder Goyal-backed LAT Aerospace has made its first move into defence by acquiring robotics startup Sharang Shakti.
Founded in 2023, Sharang Shakti builds counter-drone systems. In simple terms, it creates tech that can detect, track and stop hostile drones using radar, autonomous interceptors and machine learning.
What’s brewing: civil aviation and defence usually operate in different lanes. But according to Goyal, the core tech behind both is surprisingly similar, things like sensing, navigation, guidance and autonomous control systems.
By bringing Sharang Shakti in-house, LAT Aerospace wants to build these capabilities from the ground up and eventually use them across both defence and civilian aerospace programs.
Bottom line: this move comes at a time when India’s defence tech ecosystem is gaining serious momentum. The sector has attracted about $711 million in total equity funding across 232 rounds. Annual funding has surged from just $5 million in 2016 to a peak of $247 million in 2025 so far.
