India's Defence Tech Boom: How Startups Are Fueling a $19 Billion Market

Technology‑led systems are expected to comprise almost 50 per cent of India's overall defence market by 2030, marking a decisive shift from platform-driven development to advanced engineering and digital capability building, the report from staffing and workforce solutions provider Quess Corp said.

Momentum is strong across computer vision, autonomous systems, counter‑drone technologies, underwater robotics, advanced sensors, directed‑energy research and software‑led mission systems, fuelled by over 1,000 defence‑tech startups and 194 firms linked through innovation programmes, the report said.

The report also flagged critical shortages in specialised engineering roles including radar engineering, radio frequency engineering, avionics, propulsion, optical engineering, quantum communication systems, systems integration, test and validation and certification.

These roles account for less than 5 per cent of the current defence workforce and could bottleneck aircraft development, unmanned systems, naval projects and secure communication networks.

As much as 71 per cent of total start-up funding in defence-tech startups is directed toward counter-drone solutions, the fastest-growing segment in India's defence innovation ecosystem. The counter-drone market is projected to grow at nearly 17 per cent CAGR, reaching $1.4 billion by 2029.

"The next five years are decisive, for India to become a global systems leader, scaling defence-ready AI and frontier engineering talent by 5-6 times is not just an industry need, it is a national imperative," said Kapil Joshi, CEO - IT Staffing, Quess Corp.

Certification, safety engineering, testing and validation roles are expected to see the sharpest rise in demand. Without targeted skilling, 40-45 per cent of these roles may remain unfilled by 2030, limiting deployment readiness, slowing production cycles and affecting export competitiveness, the report added.

- IANS