If an insurance agency needs foresight on the climate patterns in the agriculture sector by the end of the year, it can consult any of the climate apps or approach experts that are adept readers of meteorological data.

But what if a food delivery app wants to know the rainfall in a particular area in the next three hours? Or a family requires the weather forecast before sending a child to school, monitoring an elderly person’s health, or planning their daily work? When a trekker wants to climb a mountain, they want location-specific information for a definite time period.

The India Meteorological Department provides forecasts multiple days ahead, but obtaining immediate hyper-local information is still a work in progress. This is a need that a new breed of weather and climate tech startups is likely to fulfill.

Unlike technology that provides solutions on a long timescale to stakeholders, weather tech involves startups that work on a very short timescales and provides impactful information dissemination for quick decisions guided by science. These companies can also help address the need to develop indigenous, low-cost sensors to gather high-resolution spatial data, which can improve forecasts.

In a step that is expected to boost the startup sector, The Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM), Pune, under the Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES), has launched an Incubation Center for Startups in Weather and Climate. This is under the government’s Mission Mausam plan, which is working towards building a “weather-ready and climate-smart nation”.

A day-long national meet, ‘Weather and Climate Innovation Meet for Startups and Entrepreneurs (WISE-2026), was held at IITM last week and signals “a new era of private-sector integration in India’s governmental meteorological services”.

“There is a critical need for collective action in addressing climate challenges. The complexity of modern weather patterns—amplified by climate change—requires a shift from traditional research to an inclusive, multi-stakeholder ecosystem,” said Dr M Ravichandran, Secretary, MoES, who was the Chief Guest at the event. The ceremony included the guest of honour Dr Shailesh Naik, Director NIAS and Former Secretary, MoES, and Dr Suryachandra Rao, Director, IITM, among others.

“One has heard of healthTech, eduTech and climateTech. But, have you heard of weatherTech? WeatherTech is the need of the hour, especially in a world where climate change changes the weather and its impact” says Dr Vinu K Valsala, Scientist at IITM Pune.

He says that the MoES generates several model outputs and observational data. These primary-level data are disseminated among the public as weather information.

If a stakeholder is a tour company that wants to know the weather conditions during the journey planned with a traveller group, they should have access to the information. There are the potential applications in agriculture and healthcare, among others. “For example, we currently can tell a farmer only how much rain is forecast; but through WeatherTech we want to enable a service that will directly tell the farmer which crop to plant and when,” says Valsala.

Startups, entrepreneurs, innovators with cutting-edge ideas will be invited to the incubation centre. They will be provided space to work as well as professional information, support, access to data and access to the legacy expertise that MoES has built over the past.

One of the challenges is the use of data. Valsala says that there would be checks and policies to ensure that India’s meteorological data is not interpreted wrongly or misused in any way.

At present, meetings are underway, and policies are being laid down. The first call is likely to be released in three months. “WeatherTech is a new concept and we expect the incubation centre to help this sector grow, flourish and enrich the lives of people in the country,” says Valsala.