Soonicorns at scale: The AI-driven sprint to India’s next unicorn wave at ET Soonicorns Summit 2025

India’s startup ecosystem is undergoing a paradigm shift as a wave of high-potential startups, or “soonicorns,” races towards unicorn status. These soonicorns, riding on the back of breakthroughs in artificial intelligence (AI), are redefining the scaling blueprint—from deeptech research and development (R&D) to billion-dollar revenue models. The Economic Times (ET) Soonicorns Summit 2025, India’s largest congregation of soonicorns, puts the spotlight at the heart of this acceleration, where the journey from lab to market meets real-world scale.