Surge unveils its eighth cohort of 12 startups across India and SEA

2026-07-14 08:23:27 Business

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Bengaluru,1st March 2023 ? Surge, Sequoia India & Southeast Asia's rapid scale-up program for early-stage startups, has launched its eighth cohort, featuring 30 inspiring founders across twelve companies. Surge 08 includes startups that are building futuristic products across climate tech, AI (Artificial Intelligence), the Metaverse, digital health, new consumer brands and new models of e-commerce.

Surge's curated community of startups now includes eight cohorts, 300+ founders and 130+ startups across 16+ sectors.

Half of Surge 08 startups have at least one female founder, including an AI and natural language processing PhD holder focused on AI in healthcare and two medical doctors from Indonesia who are leveraging technology to democratise access to health and wellness services. Surge 08 also includes two health tech companies using AI to improve insurance and medical imaging, two climate-tech companies, a metaverse gaming platform for GenZ, an AI company that's worked with NASA, as well as three exciting consumer companies that are building new-age brands in the home decor, food and wedding sectors.

"Surge 08 founders are building next-gen products and businesses that have the potential to revolutionise their sectors over the next decade. These diverse set of founders each bring with them unique experiences and expertise to create ambitious and differentiated products and platforms to the problems they are tackling ? and we are excited to be a part of their early company-building journeys," said Rajan Anandan, Managing Director, Sequoia India & Southeast Asia, and Surge.

Many founders are building for global markets from day one, and half of the startups in Surge 08 are looking to expand into the US, Europe and Canada.

Surge 08 is currently in progress and the founders are going through a 16-week hybrid program focused on company building. Past speakers and mentors in the program include Sanjeev Bikchandani (InfoEdge), Girish Mathrubootham (Freshworks), Kunal Shah (CRED), Amrish Rau (Pinelabs), Abhiraj Singh Bhal (Urban Company), Kunal Bahl (Snapdeal), Yamini Bhat (Vymo), Doug Leone (Sequoia Capital), Vijay Shekhar Sharma (Paytm), Ashwini Asokan (vue.ai/Mad Street Den), Deepinder Goyal (Zomato), Nithin Kamath (Zerodha), and Vidit Aatrey (Meesho).

For the full breakdown of Surge 08 companies, please refer to the Appendix below. To learn more about Surge 08, please head to our blog post, and find out more about each Surge 08 company here.

About Surge

Surge is Sequoia Capital India and Southeast Asia's rapid-scale up program. Surge combines up to USD 3 Mn of seed capital with company-building workshops, a global curriculum and support from a community of exceptional mentors and founders. The program's goal is to supercharge early-stage startups in India and Southeast Asia and give founders an unfair advantage, right out of the gate.

About Sequoia Capital India and Southeast Asia

Sequoia helps daring founders build legendary companies, from idea to IPO to beyond.

Sequoia Capital India and Sequoia Capital Southeast Asia actively partner with founders from a wide range of companies, across categories, including BYJUs, CRED, Druva, Five Star Finance, Freshworks, GoTo, Groww, Kopi Kenangan, Mamaearth, Pine Labs, Polygon, Razorpay, Truecaller, Zomato and more.