ARC opens waitlist for its first handheld gaming device aimed at Indian gamers

New Delhi-based startup ARC has opened a waitlist for its first handheld gaming device, designed specifically for the Indian market. The waitlist went live on July 4, 2024, offering early access to product updates, launch announcements, exclusive community initiatives, and priority purchase opportunities for those who sign up at playarc.gg.

Co-founded by Jobin Joseph and Kaustubh K. Jadhav, ARC says the device is part of an integrated gaming ecosystem that includes purpose-built hardware, a proprietary gaming operating system, software services, and a community platform. The company hasn't shared any technical specifications — like screen size, processor, or battery — nor has it revealed pricing, availability dates, or launch offers. Those details remain unknown.

What ARC is up against

India currently lacks a locally-supported premium handheld from a major brand. The closest options are imported devices with no official warranty or service. The Nintendo Switch OLED sells for ₹34,999 in India but has dated hardware. The Steam Deck, ASUS ROG Ally, and Lenovo Legion Go can cost ₹60,000 to over ₹90,000 through gray-market imports, and none offer Indian support.

Android-based handhelds like the AYN Odin 2 or Retroid Pocket series provide strong emulation and Android game performance for ₹25,000-₹45,000 via import, but again carry warranty and logistics risks. The Logitech G Cloud is another cloud-focused option but relies on a weaker processor for local tasks.

ARC believes it can fill this gap. "ARC is building an integrated gaming ecosystem: purpose-built hardware, a proprietary gaming operating system, software services, and a community-led platform," the company said via its founders. The specific features of that OS and services haven't been detailed.

Implicit bets on Android and cloud

Given the absence of information about the hardware architecture, it's reasonable to assume the device will run some form of Android or a custom OS based on Android — the most common choice for non-Windows handhelds. That would support the vast library of Android games, plus emulators for retro consoles. A custom OS could also optimize for cloud gaming services like Xbox Cloud Gaming or GeForce Now, which are gaining traction in India despite latency issues.

ARC's ecosystem pitch mirrors what Nintendo and Valve do with their own software layers, but building a proprietary OS from scratch is a multi-year engineering effort. Most existing Chinese handhelds simply use an Android launcher. ARC hasn't confirmed whether its OS is a deep fork or a themed launcher.

Founders Jobin Joseph and Kaustubh K. Jadhav have not publicly detailed their background in gaming hardware or product development, and the startup's funding status is unknown. Hardware manufacturing in India is capital-intensive, requiring supply chain relationships for PCBs, batteries, and screens that small startups find hard to secure.

Analysis

ARC is targeting a real gap — no locally-supported, premium handheld exists for Indian gamers who want dedicated controls for Android games and emulation without importing. But the company is essentially vaporware until it reveals concrete specifications, pricing, funding, and a timeline.

The biggest risk is pricing. If ARC charges under ₹15,000, it will need to cut corners on components and compete with smartphones plus clip-on controllers. If it goes above ₹30,000, it enters the territory of gray-market Steam Decks and ROG Allys, which offer PC-level performance. There is a narrow sweet spot around ₹20,000-₹25,000 where custom Android handhelds like the Odin 2 have found success overseas, but those lack local support. ARC has the chance to offer warranty and service — but only if it can manufacture and distribute at volume.

For now, the waitlist is a demand test, not a product announcement. Enthusiasts should temper expectations until ARC shows it can deliver hardware that competes on performance, build quality, and price with imported alternatives it claims to replace.

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Carnegie Mellon University and BitClave partner to improve the search experience

BitClave, the company that is disrupting the traditional ad tech market, is proud to announce its partnership with Carnegie Mellon University (CMU). This fall, BitClave is sponsoring a practicum project for graduate students in the College of Engineering’s Information Networking Institute (INI) at CMU Silicon Valley. The practicum pairs teams of students with corporate, research and government sponsors to work on groundbreaking ideas that shape our future in everything from computing and mobile systems to things like ad tech and software development.

“Community is essential for any project to be successful. The CMU tech community has been very welcoming to our team and supportive of our mission. They’re always forward-thinking and I think they see a lot of promise here,” says Alex Bessonov, CEO at BitClave.

BitClave will be bringing its extensive knowledge in blockchain and cryptocurrency to work with INI’s mobility and information security students on disruptive advertising technology. While providing the students a rich learning experience, this collaboration will benefit the BitClave’s platform as well. For instance, one such project will help to improve anonymization and ranking system of BitClave Active Search Ecosystem (BASE). BitClave’s software engineers will be working in collaboration with INI students to improve the user’s search experience while still offering a comfortable level of anonymity.

"Bridging the gap between theory and practice, the practicum affords INI students the opportunity to innovate in the wild alongside experts in the field," said Dena Haritos Tsamitis, director of the INI. "A startup like BitClave provides exposure to entrepreneurial, startup culture and frontier technologies like blockchain, while also enabling students to apply classroom knowledge to solve real-world problems."

Patrick Tague, CTO at BitClave and associate director of the INI, is excited about the possibilities, stating,“Carnegie Mellon has long had a reputation as a leader in technology, so disruptive tech like blockchain is naturally very appealing. Combining blockchain with ad tech has a lot of potential, and I think it gets people excited.”

BitClave is a startup company using blockchain to eliminate ad service middleman and create a direct connection between businesses and customers. BitClave is building a decentralized search engine that helps its users truly find what they are looking for and get compensated every time they click on search results for products and services from their favorite brands, making third-party advertising networks unnecessary and annoying ads a thing of the past.

On the BASE, customers exercise full control over their identity, deciding who has access to their data while earning CATs each time businesses use their data to make them offers. Through this platform, businesses can serve personalized, relevant offers directly to users who have already expressed interest in their products and services, significantly increasing their return on advertising spending.

Partnering with companies like BitClave is one way that the INI's students in Silicon Valley benefit from hands-on, industry experience at the epicenter of high-tech innovation. The INI's advanced, specialized curriculum combines rigorous technical topics, practical industry-oriented topics and real-world project experience to empower students to be the movers and shakers of the tech industry, whether launching a start-up, joining an enterprise R&D team or fighting cyber-crime.

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Drop Shipping Emerging To Ease Out E-Commerce Startups: All You Need to Know

Have you ever thought of doing an E-Commerce business, are you low on budget and are you tensed with all the operations you have to take into consideration? Don’t worry at all, the newly emerging concept of drop shipping is going to ease out your way tremendously. So now you might be thinking what does drop shipping stands for, isn’t it?

To make this precise and short, Drop Shipping is a method where you take orders from your customers and delegate it to the manufacturers who then will be completely liable for the dispatch and delivery of the product on your behalf. In this arrangement, the end customer will never come to know where the products are being sourced from and who is actually selling. All you have to do is to form an online store using dropshipping websites like Oberlo and extract products you wish to sell from vivid online stores available on Oberlo to your store and start selling right way.

Though Drop Shipping can be a blessing in disguise, it has its own pros and cons which eventually should be taken care before planning to start a Drop Shipping E-commerce start-up.

Pros

• Non Maintenance of Physical Inventory
  Drop Shipping eliminates your part in which you need to maintain a physical stock hence reducing costs involved in warehousing right away.
• Low Startup Costs
  Due to the pointer no. 1 start-up costs here are eliminated to the fullest or reduced to a very high extent.
• A variety of options for products
  With such an arrangement the options for products available are vivid and manufacturers are also in large quantities for a single product line.
• Emphasis on selling
  By using Drop Shipping at your disposal you can totally eliminate the need to concentrate on operations and totally devote your time to marketing and selling the products.
• Quick and Easy Setup
  Setting up such store online is very convenient and even easy for a novice to understand & operate. Drop Shipping can be started instantly within a few minutes of setting up your stores.
• Time-Saving
  The entire process of Drop Shipping is totally time-saving as various factors like operations, inventory handling, shipments are taken care by the third party hence letting you concentrate totally on marketing & selling products.
• Elimination of middlemen
  Drop Shipping eliminates the middlemen where you actually buy products from the manufacturers and they then ship the same to your customers.
• Exploring new markets
  With Drop shipping on board, you can easily explore new products and international destinations easily without indulging into R & D initially.
• Flexible Working Hours
  Since no physical inventory is maintained and no paper work is required, you can work as and when required. Totally flexible upon your availability and requirements.

With such wonderful advantages, it's quite possible to have a few disadvantages as well. Let’s just discuss the same below.

Cons of Drop Shipping Services

• Reliable & efficient Shipper
  It is not always possible that your manufacturer isn’t serving various others like you which ultimately goes against the manufacturer where he or she may prioritize others for the same products being sold by you.
• Mistakes are obvious
  Since your manufacturers who would be your shipper as well serves a number of others as well, 100 percent efficiency in completely shipping the products with 100 percent accuracy is something never seen anywhere. When the shippers are managing a lot of orders at the same time mistakes are ought to happen.
• Delayed Shipping
  Actual shipping from the date ordered may vary between 1 to 30 days since the majority of the products are international based and customers may not choose you if your estimated delivery time is anywhere more than 10 days or even less sometimes.
• Products may vary
  When you actually let customers buy from your online store and shippers to the rest, actual product ordered and shipped will vary with color, size or even type. This is a huge cause of worry when orders are in large numbers with your shippers.
• High Competition
  Drop Shipping cannot assure you cheap products since your products might be sold by the manufacturer at various other online places as well. Making the market more competitive altogether. Large stocking retailers get better deals than you since they are buying a huge quantity which eventually will attract the manufacturer.
• Self-branding is not possible
  If you tend to attract customer with branding and better packaging, it's totally not possible since you are not packing and shipping hence the quality of products and packaging cannot be assured at the shippers level.
• Customer Satisfaction is a big headache
  Just imagine a scenario where your store shows the product is in stock but until you fulfill all the formalities your manufacturer might go out of stock and might take a bit of time to get the same in stock again which eventually results in order cancellation and you might lose a reliable and loyal customer.
• Shipping charges may vary for your customer
  Since you are not buying products from one location and the shipping charges for various products bought from your store might vary. In this case, customers tend to not look at your products and go on to select some other who may possibly rest them with better shipping deals.

Conclusion:

Now that you have gone through the probable pros and cons of choosing Drop Shipping, we are sure you can ascertain the results of the same in the case being used for a new E-Commerce start-up. Safe playing and with a lot of R&D you can literally make Drop Shipping a boon for you and your business else, it may cause worries and prove a big nightmare which might go against your brand name as well. This method may yield you with huge sales and profit but at the same time can become a cause for your worry if not implemented properly. Hence make sure you do your research and talk to a few who already are into the same. Probably a Drop Shipper who discontinued might guide you and give exact pros and cons which will be helpful to your new startup. All the best, please leave your comments below in case you need further clarifications on the above topic.

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DST, Intel India and SINE-IIT Bombay collaborate to incubate hardware and systems start-ups

Reinforcing their commitment to fostering innovation and entrepreneurship as a step towards making Digital India successful, Department of Science & Technology (DST), Government of India, Intel Technology India Pvt. Ltd (“Intel India”), and Society for Innovation & Entrepreneurship (SINE), IIT Bombay have collaborated to launch the Collaborative Incubation Program for Hardware and Systems Startups (“Program”).

This is a unique program wherein the industry, academia and Government have come together to support hardware and systems-based start-ups in the country through mentoring, training, lab facilities, hardware kits, prototyping, business services,  funding, etc.,

The announcement was made on Saturday in the presence of Prof. Ashutosh Sharma, Secretary, Department of Science and Technology, Government of India, Mr. Ramesh Abhishek, Secretary, Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion, Government of India, Ms. Nivruti Rai, General Manager, Intel India, Vice President, Platform Engineering Group, Intel, Professor Devang Khakhar, Director of IIT, Bombay.

Nivruti Rai, General Manager, Intel India, Vice President, Platform Engineering Group, Intel; said, “Intel has a strong focus on accelerating innovation and entrepreneurship in India, and we are committed to help enable startups in the systems area, both hardware and software. Along with DST and SINE, IIT Bombay, Intel India will provide the critical support these starts ups need to be able to excel in creating market ready products and solutions.”

Second from left-Ms. Nivruti Rai, General Manager, Intel India, Vice President, Platform Engineering Group, Intel

• The Program will address gaps in the hardware and systems start-up ecosystem that companies face in product design, development, commercialization, and creating scale for their solutions.

• DST, Intel India and SINE aim to support up to 20 start-ups under this Program, and the call for applications for the first batch will be announced in early August 2016.

• During the year-long Program, start-ups will be supported for six months on-site at SINE, IIT, Bombay or Intel India, Bengaluru. After a period of six months, the start-ups’ solutions will be showcased to investors and industry players at a demo day, post which, the Program will extend virtual support for another six months.

• Participating start-ups will be incubated through intensive training periods, one-on-one mentoring, technology related support from Intel experts, business service support from SINE, as well as prototyping and manufacturing support.

• Intel India will:

• Build capacities through mentors, and provide technology related support for productization, and

• Facilitate ideation, design thinking, prototyping workshops and manufacturing support through industry experts. 

 

Collaborative Incubation Program for Hardware and Systems Startups 

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