Unacademy Founders Longshot Capital AI Deeptech Fund Explained: Rs 700 Crore for India's AI and Deeptech Startups (India)

unacademy founders longshot capital ai deeptech fund explained

Image: Wikimedia Commons / Kushagra140, CC BY-SA 4.0 — panoramic Bengaluru skyline (illustrative image; Longshot Capital has no public logo or office photos, and no Unacademy press photo is reused here).

TL;DR: Unacademy founders Longshot Capital AI deeptech fund explained: Gaurav Munjal and Roman Saini are reportedly raising a Rs 700 crore venture fund for AI and deeptech startups, with about Rs 300 crore already committed and a first close targeted for January 2027. Saini will run the fund full-time while Munjal stays involved part-time — a founder-to-funder pivot weeks after upGrad acquired Unacademy.

📌 KEY HIGHLIGHTS

Longshot Capital, a new venture fund from Unacademy founders Gaurav Munjal and Roman Saini, is reportedly targeting Rs 700 crore for AI and deeptech startups.
About Rs 300 crore in commitments is already secured, with a first close targeted for January 2027, after which the fund plans to start investing.
Roman Saini will lead the fund full-time; Gaurav Munjal, who continues to head Unacademy, will be involved part-time.
The plan is to back 25–28 seed and pre-Series A startups with initial cheques of $500,000–$1.5 million, across AI, manufacturing, space, defence and robotics.
The fund is reported, not yet announced: its size and first-close timing could still change, according to The Economic Times.

What happened?

Less than two months after upGrad acquired Unacademy, the edtech company's founders are moving to the other side of the table. According to an exclusive report in The Economic Times published on 26 October 2026, Gaurav Munjal and Roman Saini are raising a Rs 700 crore venture capital fund named Longshot Capital, focused on artificial intelligence and deeptech startups.

The report, citing people with knowledge of the matter, says the fund has already secured commitments of about Rs 300 crore and is targeting its first close in January 2027, following which it plans to begin investing. Fundraising discussions are still under way, and both the size of the fund and the timing of the first close could change. NewsBytes independently reported the same core facts on 26 October, confirming the fund's name, the Rs 300 crore in commitments and the January 2027 first-close target.

One honesty note matters here: this is a reported plan, not a company announcement. Neither founder has publicly confirmed the fund, and no portfolio company, limited partner or regulator filing has been named. Everything below follows the reporting — and where the reporting is thin, this post says so.

Unacademy founders Longshot Capital AI deeptech fund explained: what it will back

Longshot Capital is aimed squarely at the earliest, hardest stage of deeptech investing: seed and pre-Series A rounds, where a company may have a prototype and a team but little revenue. Here is the reported plan at a glance.

Detail	Reported plan	Why it matters
Fund size	Rs 700 crore target; about Rs 300 crore committed so far	Just under half the target is already lined up before the first close
First close	January 2027 (target; could change)	Investing starts after the first close, not before
Portfolio	25–28 startups	A concentrated early-stage portfolio, not a spray-and-pray fund
First cheques	$500,000–$1.5 million per startup	Seed-sized cheques for seed-stage companies
Sectors	AI, manufacturing, space, defence, robotics	Deeptech and frontier tech, not consumer apps
Who runs it	Roman Saini full-time; Gaurav Munjal part-time	One founder fully dedicated, the other still running Unacademy

unacademy founders longshot capital ai deeptech fund explained startup office

Image: Wikimedia Commons / Deskmag, CC BY-SA 3.0 — open-plan co-working space (illustrative image).

The founders arrive with an angel track record: The Economic Times reports they have made more than 200 angel investments between them, deploying over Rs 25 crore. That history is Longshot's pitch to founders — operators who have built a company, not just financed them. It also follows a pattern in Indian tech: Snapdeal founders Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal have similarly set up investment funds after their operating careers.

Why it matters for India readers

The timing is the story. Indian startup funding has cooled sharply: venture funding fell to $96 million across 15 deals in the third week of October 2026, according to YourStory, the eighth week this year below $100 million, and there have been only 16 deals of $100 million or more in all of 2026. The week's largest deal, Even Healthcare's $50 million Series B, was a healthtech round — not a deeptech one.

Deeptech feels that chill most. At TechSparks 2026, experts said India's deeptech startups need patient capital and global ambition, but still face funding gaps and manufacturing weaknesses. A seed fund dedicated to AI, space, defence and robotics is aimed directly at that gap: the stage where Indian deeptech companies most often stall for lack of a first institutional cheque.

The founders' own recent words fit the same argument. On 25 October, Munjal pushed back publicly against the view that Indian venture capitalists are too cautious to back ambitious startups, calling that assessment "very dated" and citing Astrotalk, Airbound and Sarvam AI as examples of startups that raised and grew quickly, alongside Groww, Eternal and Meesho. Longshot Capital, if it closes as reported, would be Munjal and Saini putting their own money — and their investors' money — behind that argument.

From Unacademy to Longshot: the upGrad chapter

Longshot only exists because the Unacademy chapter closed. Unacademy completed its sale to rival upGrad on 1 September 2026, in a deal reported at about Rs 1,955 crore (roughly $200 million) — a fraction of its $3.4 billion peak valuation in 2021. Munjal has been blunt about that gap, saying the company had every option to keep going independently, with roughly Rs 900 crore in cash, a topline of about Rs 400 crore, and most businesses profitable or close to it, but that the sale was a strategic choice rather than a forced one.

For founders weighing a Longshot cheque, that history cuts both ways, and honestly so. On one side is a decade of operating experience: building Unacademy from a YouTube channel in 2010 into one of India's best-known learning platforms. On the other is the ending: a unicorn sold at a steep discount to its peak. Both are part of the pitch — and both are why the fund's name, Longshot, feels apt for the deeptech bets it plans to make.

Should you care?

✅ Verdict: A fund to watch, not one to bank on yet. If you are a founder building in AI, space, defence or robotics, Longshot Capital could become a genuine early-stage option from early 2027 — but it is a reported plan, not a closed fund. Watch for the January 2027 first close: that is the moment this story turns from report into reality. For everyone else, it is a useful signal that India's founder class is now funding the next generation's riskiest bets.

FAQs

What is Longshot Capital? Longshot Capital is a venture capital fund reportedly being raised by Unacademy founders Gaurav Munjal and Roman Saini to back AI and deeptech startups in India. It is named in The Economic Times' exclusive report of 26 October 2026 and has not yet been formally announced by the founders.

How big is the Longshot Capital fund? The reported target is Rs 700 crore, with about Rs 300 crore in commitments already secured. Because fundraising is still under way, both the final size and the timing could change.

When will Longshot Capital start investing? The fund is targeting its first close in January 2027, and it plans to begin investing after that close. No portfolio company has been named yet.

Which startups will Longshot Capital back? The plan is to back 25–28 seed and pre-Series A startups with initial cheques of $500,000–$1.5 million, focusing on AI, manufacturing, space, defence and robotics.

Who runs Longshot Capital? Roman Saini will lead the fund full-time, while Gaurav Munjal, who continues to head Unacademy, will be involved part-time. The pair have made more than 200 angel investments together, deploying over Rs 25 crore.

Is Longshot Capital confirmed? Not yet. The fund is reported by The Economic Times citing people with knowledge of the matter, and corroborated in its core facts by NewsBytes. Until the founders announce it or a first close is confirmed, treat the size, timing and strategy as reported, not final.

Takeaway

Two founders who built — and then sold — one of India's biggest edtech companies are reportedly raising Rs 700 crore to fund the next generation's hardest bets: early-stage AI and deeptech. The January 2027 first close is the date that will prove whether Longshot Capital is real.

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