Goldman Sachs estimates that India's listed artificial intelligence market could gain an additional $50-100 billion in market capitalisation over the next two to five years as privately held AI companies move towards initial public offerings. According to the report, the potential comes from 25-50% of 71 companies at growth, late, infrastructure or buyout investment stages, which have a combined estimated value of $54 billion. These companies are currently valued at around $55 billion in total, with the report assuming an average IPO valuation of four times their current estimated value. As per Timothy Moe, co-head of Asia macro research and chief Asia-Pacific equity strategist at Goldman Sachs, the listings could broaden India's listed AI universe, bringing several underrepresented segments of the AI value chain into the public markets.
Private equity funding for Indian AI startups has experienced dramatic growth, with funding rising to around $5 billion in 2025 from $1.6 billion in 2024. As reported by Goldman Sachs, funding in the first eight to nine months of 2026 had already matched the previous year's total, putting investment on course to exceed the 2025 record. The report notes that AI's share of total private equity funding in India rose from around 5% in 2024 to approximately 20% in 2026, with private equity funding for Indian AI startups having tripled since 2024. According to Stanford University's 2026 AI Index Report, India ranked sixth globally for private AI funding in 2025 and fourth for the number of newly funded AI companies, challenging the perception that India remains on the periphery of the global AI buildout.
Of the 84 privately held Indian companies with significant AI value chain exposure, Goldman Sachs has identified 71 companies at growth, late, infrastructure or buyout investment stages, with the potential listings expected to broaden the market beyond its current concentration in AI infrastructure. These companies, known as Private AI Contenders, account for nearly 40% of all AI-related private capital raised in India since 2025 and span the value chain, from infrastructure providers and core AI developers to businesses deploying AI across industries. The largest segment by value is upstream AI enablers, comprising companies involved in power generation, power equipment, transmission, semiconductor supply chains, chip design, quantum computing, datacentres, cloud services and data management, with an estimated current value of $35 billion. Downstream AI adopters, which apply AI across sectors such as healthcare, financial services and enterprise software, account for $18 billion, while core AI model companies account for $2 billion.
The potential IPO listings could introduce new areas to India's AI market beyond current infrastructure focus. According to Goldman Sachs, these areas include data centre operators, enterprise AI services, conversational AI, cloud and data management, healthcare AI and computer vision. The report emphasizes that these listings could significantly broaden the market's scope and provide investors with exposure to different segments of the AI ecosystem. Goldman Sachs estimates that upstream AI enablers could account for 66% of the potential AI-related listings, followed by downstream AI adopters at 31% and midstream AI core engines at 3%. The companies are concentrated in established technology and business hubs, led by Bengaluru, Delhi-NCR, Mumbai and Hyderabad, with Ahmedabad, Pune and Chennai emerging as additional centres of activity.
