New Delhi

India'snew-age economy is projected to triple to USD 300 billion in revenue by financial year 2030-31, closely approaching the scale of the country’s IT services sector, according to a report by Redseer Strategy Consultants.

A new-age economy is driven by AI, knowledge capital, and digital innovation. The combined revenue of domestic new-age companies is estimated to rise from USD 33 billion in FY22 to around USD 100 billion in FY26, before growing at 25 per cent annually to touch the USD 300-billion mark by FY31, the report noted.

According to Redseer, consumption-led sectors comprising consumer goods, retail, and leisure will remain the cornerstone of this expansion, growing at 25 per cent annually to reach USD 150 billion by FY31 and accounting for nearly half of the overall market. Meanwhile, emerging technology sectors such as technology, media, and telecom (TMT), artificial intelligence (AI), and advanced manufacturing are projected to grow at 26 per cent annually.

On operational performance, the report highlighted that the collective profit pool turned positive in FY25, staging a turnaround to USD 1.4 billion. However, profitability remains heavily concentrated. "BFSI alone is 140 per cent of the FY25 pool; take it out and every other sector put together is still loss-making," the report stated, adding that a USD 300-billion top line by FY31 implies a total profit pool of USD 5–10 billion (2 to 3 per cent margin), compared to 12–18 per cent for listed FMCG firms and 20–25 per cent for IT services. The report also pointed out that the time required for consumer goods brands to achieve scale has significantly compressed. Owing to the rapid expansion of direct-to-consumer (D2C) channels and quick commerce, the average time taken to reach Rs 100 crore in revenue fell from 6.8 years for brands in 2016 to 3.4 years for the 2020 cohort. Similarly, the time to hit Rs 500 crore halved from 7.9 years to 4 years. Redseer expects the number of new-age consumer brands with revenues above Rs 100 crore to surge from roughly 90 in FY22 and 230 in FY26 to approximately 500 by FY31. However, scaling beyond the "Rs 500-crore wall" remains a key hurdle due to the requirement of building deep offline distribution networks, modern trade capabilities, and working capital infrastructure.