Google and Accel Select Five India-Tied AI Startups for Atoms Accelerator with Up to $2M Funding

Google and Accel have selected five startups for the latest cohort of their Atoms accelerator program focused on artificial intelligence products linked to India. The selected companies are K-Dense, which is building an AI co-scientist to accelerate research in fields such as life sciences and chemistry, Dodge.ai, which develops autonomous agents for enterprise ERP systems, Persistence Labs, which focuses on voice AI for call center operations, Zingroll, which is building a platform for AI-generated films and shows, and LevelPlane, which applies AI to industrial automation in automotive and aerospace manufacturing. Startups selected for the program will receive up to $2 million in funding from Accel and Google's AI Futures Fund along with up to $350,000 in cloud and AI compute credits from Google. The program was announced in November. This year's program received nearly four times the applications of previous Accel Atoms cohorts. Roughly 70 percent of the rejected applications were wrappers. Wrappers are startups that layered AI features such as chatbots on top of existing software but were not reimagining new workflows using AI, according to Accel partner Prayank Swaroop. Many of the remaining denied applications fell into crowded categories such as marketing automation and AI recruitment tools. About 62 percent of the submissions focused on productivity tools and another 13 percent on software development and coding. Jonathan Silber, co-founder and director of Google's AI Futures Fund, said the five startups selected aligned closely with areas where Google expects AI to see deeper real-world adoption. The program does not require startups to use Google's models exclusively. The goal is to gather feedback from startups on how Google's models perform in real-world applications.