How a startup is building drones, satellites in Noida

MC INTERVIEW How a startup is building drones, satellites in Noida

In Noida’s sector 80 lined with industrial sheds, a non-descript glass and chrome building may not attract much attention. It's an unlikely place for a drone and space tech startup.

Inside, dozens of young engineers, some fresh out of college are working to build a space tech company.

Founders Akash and Jyoti Sinha keep track of each and every circuit, guiding the young team to build some of the smartest drones and satellites for the India Army and Air Force.

Their company, Omnipresent Robot Technologies, is building a satellite which will go into space most likely next year with funding from the Ministry of Defence. It is one of the early recipients of the IDEX grant from the ministry which provides seed money for cutting-edge defence tech projects that the armed forces need.

As part of this, the company, working with the defence establishment, has done some mapping on the borders and is working on building a bunch of satellites that are slated to go up, if all goes to plan. They are also working on AI technology for the Indian Air Force, with trials underway in one major air base. The husband-wife duo, both professors, returned to India after more than 12 years in the United States where they built robots and other sophisticated gadgets for the US army.

After graduating from the Delhi College of Engineering, both left for the US to complete their masters degree from two prestigious universities Carnegie Mellon and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). They returned to teach at a private university in Noida but the Defence’s ministry’s move to open up the sector to private participation and startups caught their attention and prompted them to try their hand at building drones and satellites.

“When we first came back here, things were difficult but we have seen a lot of change in the last five years specially to do with some of the programmes that the government has come up with and how they have opened up the space, mapping sectors and how they have come up with IDEX and ADITI and RDI funds and schemes like that. That actually now seems very similar to the kind of funding schemes they used to have in the US,” Akash Sinha, told Moneycontrol in one of the labs surrounded by some menacing drones.

Innovations for Defence Excellence (iDEX) framework was launched by the government in 2018 to foster innovation and technology development in the Defence and Aerospace sectors by engaging industries including MSMEs, startups, individual innovators, R&D institutes and academia and promote self-reliance.

Procurement worth over Rs 2,400 crore has been approved from start-ups and MSMEs, and projects worth more than Rs 1,500 crore have been sanctioned for new technologies. 676 start-ups and innovators have been engaging through iDEX, with 551 contracts signed as of March 2026, govt data showed.

Speaking to Moneycontrol earlier on the wider defence research funding programme for startups, Defence Secretary Rajesh Kumar Singh said, “From the DRDO, we now have an internal earmarking that 25% of our R&D budget is reserved for industry, for startups and for academia. We also have this scheme of centers of excellence. We have some 11 centers of excellence across different academic institutions where we work, along with the academia in specific domains in defence.”

“As far as procurement is concerned, defence is the only department which has a scheme called IDEX, which actually promotes startups, ensuring that they are supported till they build prototypes,” said Singh. “Thereafter, of course, they have to go through a bidding process. But in our revived defence procurement procedure, we are trying to bring in systems where if something is developed in consultation with or in conjunction with the services or with us, that we should give him some repeat orders, at least for a certain period of time, say five years until and thereafter make it open.”

The Noida startup’s work fits into this wider new ecosystem of defence tech funding. The company was selected out of 75 firms which bid for the project to build satellites and received funding to build prototypes. Under the scheme, once a prototype is built to the specs provided by the ministry, the company gets an assured order which is several times the amount of the original grant.“One of the good things is that this assured order or MOQ as they call it, minimum order quantity. That is now being signed as part of the contract itself,” said Sinha.

“When we are signing the IDEX or ADITI contract as part of the contract, MOQ is also signed. Which is actually very assuring because the government also expects 50% funding to be invested by industry. So for investors to have that comfort, having that MOQ signed,” said Sinha.

Jyoti Sinha, says an assured MOQ is very encouraging for the startups who aim to engage with the defence sector. “Otherwise the small startups are most of the time beaten by big players,” said Jyoti.

The startup is building the world’s highest resolution 3D mapping satellite constellation, says Akash, adding that for the Chandrayaan project, their firm had developed the mapping and navigation software for the Pragyan rover.

“Once the rover came out, it was running and driving on the technology that we built,” said Akash detailing their expertise in precise 3D mapping.

He said that after the Chandrayaan project , they were also part of the Saumitra mission.

“There we mapped more than 10,000 villages across India with our 3D mapping drones,” said Akash.

Currently there is probably just one 3D constellation in the world which is called Leo constellation, which is doing precise 3D mapping and geolocalisation.

“One thing is to create a 3D and then the other aspect is to give exact GPS coordinates of that. Both of these aspects we are addressing. We are addressing at a less than a metre level resolution, even in mountainous areas.

“This has never been done before anywhere in the world. But with the technology that we are developing and the way we are approaching and the results we have got in our initial work, we are quite confident,” said Akash.

The startup has also come up with the Bird X solution, which they are deploying at airports to reduce the number of bird hits. The first trial and installation was conducted at a vital air base and the solution is now being scaled up.

“We are targeting to reduce bird hits by 80%. And so there we actually got to work very closely with the Indian Air Force. We got to understand their problems. We had constant feedback, which actually helped us,” said Akash.

The company is also working on a technology that would drive the kamikaze drones to work in the GPS denied or GNSS denied conditions.

“Imagine that you are flying blind. You don't have a GPS or GPS is jammed or spoofed. You are able to go or reach the target and drop a payload or even destroy yourself on a particular type, said Jyoti

“We are developing the niche technology that can help any company which is developing these either kamikaze drones to work in those restrained conditions,” adds Jyoti.

Asked how difficult it was to access talent for setting up such a high tech startup in Noida, Akash and Jyoti said they have some of the best talent working with them.

“We had hired quite a few people from IIT Delhi, IIT Kanpur. Indian Institute of Space Technology has been a great place because it’s one institution that focuses on space technology.

Asked whether US President Donald Trump's clampdown on work visas for Indian students was helping the company access talent from the United States, Akash said their company had hired some engineers directly from the US.

“In fact, we hired one of the toppers of an AI program from Carnegie Mellon where I also studied,” said Akash.

Not only the freshers, but even people at the mid-level are available who want to relocate to India. Whatever Trump is doing, he is definitely helping India, at least in terms of the reverse brain drain,” said Jyoti and Akash pointing to a group of young engineers huddled around a large table and working animatedly to bring to life a high tech drone.

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