Nvidia has joined a $14 million Series B round for Indian AI‑inference startup Simplismart, aiming to support software that lets companies run models more efficiently and, in some cases, with fewer GPUs. The round was led by Dallas Venture Capital and included Accel, Shastra VC and Micromax, valuing the four‑year‑old company at roughly $100 million after the investment.
Businesses are spending heavily on GPUs to power AI workloads, yet achieving reliable and cost‑effective scaling remains difficult. Different applications require trade‑offs among speed, cost and performance, and fine‑tuning deployments can be complex. Simplismart’s platform automates much of that work, adapting model execution to existing hardware so customers do not have to manage the configurations themselves.
“Nobody actually needs the fastest or the cheapest inference,” said Amritanshu Jain, co‑founder and CEO of Simplismart, in an interview. He added that firms need performance and cost levels that fit their specific use cases. The company’s software sits between AI models and the underlying compute, adjusting deployment parameters to meet client requirements. It can optimize response time, request throughput and power consumption, helping users extract more value from their current GPU inventory.
Based in Bengaluru, Simplismart lets customers run AI models via its own platform or within their cloud or on‑premises environments. The suite includes tools for model fine‑tuning, automatic scaling of compute resources as demand fluctuates, and performance monitoring. It also enables cloud providers to build and operate AI inference services on GPU infrastructure using Simplismart’s technology.
The startup cites a 56 percent reduction in GPU serving costs for video‑generation platform InVideo as a success story. It also works with AI video companies HeyGen and Higgsfield, enterprise AI firm Ema, and Indian cloud provider Yotta, which uses the technology to power the serverless AI inference service in its Shakti Studio platform.
Jain told TechCrunch that Simplismart’s annualized revenue run rate has grown fourteen‑fold over the past six months to an eight‑figure amount. The figure reflects recent customer usage rather than contracted recurring revenue and excludes pass‑through revenue to infrastructure providers; the exact number was not disclosed. More than half of the revenue comes from the United States, even though the company has a larger customer base in India.
Alongside the investment, Nvidia is collaborating with Simplismart on technical integration, including work around Nvidia’s Dynamo inference software. The partnership involves Simplismart engineers and Nvidia solutions architects, and Nvidia has helped introduce the startup to potential customers and partners.
The deal may seem paradoxical, as Nvidia dominates the AI‑chip market while supporting software that can reduce GPU demand. Jain argued that improving inference efficiency ultimately benefits Nvidia by making its hardware more attractive and encouraging broader AI adoption.
Simplismart competes in a crowded AI‑inference space that includes Nvidia’s own offerings as well as solutions from major cloud providers such as Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure. A growing number of startups are also building tools to make AI models faster and cheaper to run, driven by rising demand for AI applications and the need to stretch expensive GPU resources.
“Where we tend to win is where people have to be more stringent on their SLAs and total cost of ownership,” Jain said, referring to strict performance and cost requirements. Unlike rivals that provide preset fast‑or‑cheap options, Simplismart seeks a balance tailored to each customer’s needs.
Founded in 2022 by former Oracle engineer Amritanshu Jain and former Google engineer Devansh Ghatak, the company grew out of the pair’s experience building and deploying machine‑learning systems. The two met while studying at BITS Pilani and now lead a team of 58 employees.
The fresh capital will be used to expand Simplismart’s presence in the United States, grow its workforce and further develop its inference software. Jain emphasized that the U.S. remains a key market as the startup builds on its existing customer base there.
The announcement follows a report in The Economic Times that Simplismart was in talks to raise $40 million to $50 million at a $300 million to $400 million valuation. Jain declined to comment on the report, noting that the company is not actively fundraising and that the Series B round is closed.