Coromandel International's VC arm invests in drone startup Dhaksha Unmanned Systems

14 Sep 2022 , 02:05 PM

Dare Ventures, the venture capital arm of Coromandel International Limited has announced its third investment this year into a differentiated drone startup, Dhaksha Unmanned Systems Private Limited.

The company aims to use this funding for talent acquisition, R&D and production scale up.

Dhaksha, one of the forerunners in the drone space in India, provides a complete range of Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) technology solutions for different applications covering agriculture, defence, surveillance and delivery, among others. Based out of Chennai, the company has over the years developed expertise in drone R&D, testing, manufacturing, and customer support. In addition to having developed capability to manufacture battery-operated drones, Dhaksha is the only company in India to manufacture petrol engine-based drones.

The “Agrigator” drone developed by Dhaksha targeting the agriculture industry, helps farmers with the application of fertilizers and crop protection products. Agrigator comes with a 12L spray tank and can cover up to 30-35 acres per day with 8-hour usage. The company’s petrol engine based defence drone “SwarmGator” is a winner of the prestigious “Mehar Baba Swarm Drone Competition” for drone architecture, organised by the Indian Air Force.

In collaboration with the prestigious Anna University, Dhaksha won this competing against 154 companies. In addition, the company has also developed targeted drones with specific use-case solutions across surveillance, goods delivery and mining.

Commenting on the investment, Ramanathan Narayanan, Director and CEO of Dhaksha said, “We are excited to partner with Dare Ventures. I am confident this will help us create several milestones in the drone industry, deliver world-class drones, offer exceptional support to customers across India and make the company a frontrunner in realizing the government’s vision of making India a ‘Global Hub’ for Drones.”

At around 2:08 PM, Coromandel International Ltd is currently trading at Rs1,024.95 per share down by Rs10.05 or 0.97% from its previous closing of Rs1,035 per share on the BSE.

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