India’s first privately developed compact tokamak, PRAGYA, has successfully produced plasma, marking a significant milestone in the country’s emerging private nuclear fusion ecosystem. The machine, built by Bengaluru-based deep-tech startup Pranos Fusion, represents the first time a private Indian entity has designed, constructed, and operated a tokamak device from scratch . This achievement transitions India’s private fusion efforts from the design and manufacturing phase into the experimental operation phase, laying a critical foundation for future attempts to harness fusion energy .
PRAGYA is a compact, low-aspect-ratio tokamak designed primarily as an experimental testbed rather than a commercial power generator. A tokamak uses powerful magnetic fields to confine extremely hot plasma inside a doughnut-shaped chamber, creating conditions where light atomic nuclei can eventually fuse and release vast amounts of energy—the same process that powers the Sun . The machine stands approximately four feet tall and was constructed in about eight months . While PRAGYA cannot yet conduct nuclear fusion, its purpose is to study and control plasma, the superheated fourth state of matter essential for achieving fusion, and to serve as a platform for testing technologies that could eventually be integrated into larger fusion reactors .
The Bengaluru startup, founded in 2024 by Shaurya Kaushal and Roshan George, has assembled a twelve-member team of specialists including physicists, computational scientists, and engineers with expertise spanning plasma physics, aerospace engineering, and materials science . The company’s journey has been bootstrap-based, beginning with a government seed grant and founders’ savings before raising $6.8 million in March 2026** in a round co-led by pi Ventures and Ankur Capital, bringing total funding to just over **$7 million . Pranos operates from a modest two-room laboratory that could easily be mistaken for any Bengaluru tech startup, with the squat steel tokamak vessel offering a glimpse through its clear viewport of the plasma cooking inside .
PRAGYA is part of a broader three-pronged technology programme that Pranos has outlined to build the machinery India would need to generate power from fusion. The integrated stack includes JENGA, a design and plasma-control platform that functions as a digital twin, coupling plasma physics with plant engineering to test configurations in simulation before committing to hardware . The second component is MAGGA, a programme focused on developing fusion-grade high-temperature superconducting magnets, which are critical because stronger magnets allow for smaller, more compact machines . Pranos aims to have its high-temperature superconducting magnet technology operational by 2027 . The third element is PRAGYA itself, a compact spherical tokamak that, while squatter and harder to engineer than classical designs, is cheaper to build .
The company plans to operate PRAGYA for nearly two decades, targeting between 10 and 12 experimental shots per day, or roughly 3,000 shots annually. This high-frequency experimental regime is expected to generate a large volume of data on plasma behaviour, tokamak design, and control systems . Each experimental run begins with the tokamak creating an extremely high vacuum inside its vessel, after which hydrogen isotopes—hydrogen or deuterium—are injected and heated until the atoms lose their electrons, transforming the gas into an electrically charged plasma . During operations, the core team monitors plasma temperature, density, and pressure, along with fuel injection and safety interlocks, in a process that resembles a well-oiled military control room .
The path forward for Pranos extends well beyond PRAGYA. By 2030, the company hopes to build a net-gain fusion reactor called PraniQ, a far more ambitious machine designed to demonstrate a major milestone in fusion development—achieving a positive energy balance where the fusion reaction produces more energy than it consumes . The company’s founders have stated that about five nuclear fusion reactors around the world are preparing to be launched around 2030, and they intend for Pranos to be among them . A critical intermediate step involves the development of high-temperature superconducting magnets, which Pranos aims to have operational by 2027 . These magnets are essential because they enable the confinement of plasma at temperatures of 100-150 million degrees Celsius, hot enough for hydrogen nuclei to overcome their mutual electrical repulsion and fuse .
Pranos has established strategic partnerships to advance its goals, including co-incubation at the Institute for Plasma Research (IPR), which runs India’s operational tokamaks, and at JNCASR . The company’s plasma control systems are being developed with a view to eventual deployment on IPR’s existing machines . Beyond hardware, Pranos wants PRAGYA to become a training ground for India’s next generation of plasma physicists and fusion engineers, believing that building a domestic talent pipeline will be as important as building the machines themselves .
India has traditionally pursued fusion research through government-backed institutions and its participation in international projects such as ITER. PRAGYA’s emergence adds a new private-sector dimension to that effort, as startups begin attempting to translate decades of fusion science into working engineering systems . The scale of Pranos’ ambition should be viewed in context: while global fusion leaders like Commonwealth Fusion Systems and Helion Energy have raised billions of dollars between them and have not yet generated net power, Pranos has raised approximately $7 million and is attempting to build the industrial base rather than win a race . The company’s early entry into the private fusion arena could nonetheless accelerate the journey from laboratory experiments to commercially viable fusion, positioning India to potentially capture a share of a future global fusion energy market . For Pranos, the journey has only just begun, but PRAGYA could become an important laboratory in India’s race to harness the power of the stars .
