75% of Road Deaths: Can This Startup’s Radical AI Solution Save Two-Wheeler Riders?

Cautio acquires Bytes to bring video telematics to India’s two-wheelers

• Visual telematics startup Cautio has acquired Bytes in a full buyout.
• The deal expands Cautio’s safety infrastructure from vehicle fleets to the high-risk two-wheeler segment.

Bangalore-based visual telematics startup Cautio has acquired Bytes, an AI safety firm backed by Nikhil Kamath’s WTFund. While financial terms were not disclosed, sources close to the deal describe it as a 100% buyout, with the transaction expected to close within the coming weeks.

The acquisition marks a distinct shift for Cautio. Until now, the company—founded by Ankit Acharya and Pranjal Nadhani—has focused on the four-wheeler fleet market, deploying dashcams and safety intelligence for cabs, logistics, and autos across 50 cities. By absorbing Bytes, Cautio is moving into the most volatile segment of Indian traffic: the two-wheeler market.

“Two-wheelers are the backbone of Indian mobility, yet they carry almost three-fourths of our road fatalities,” Cautio CEO Ankit Acharya told stakeholders. “That mismatch is the gap we’re going after.”

Solving the hardware constraint

Integrating Bytes is a technical play rather than a simple feature add-on. The entire Bytes team is set to join Cautio’s R&D division. Their primary focus has been engineering vision-based AI for environments where standard dashcams fail.

Two-wheelers present a unique engineering challenge: limited space for hardware, unstable power supplies, and aggressive vehicle vibration. Bytes has focused its stack on low-power edge computing and “mounting flexibility”—essential features for tracking risk on a scooter weaving through Bangalore traffic.

“The future of safety in India cannot be four-wheeler first,” said an early investor in Cautio. “If you don’t solve for two-wheelers, you haven’t solved the problem.”

Post-acquisition, Cautio intends to direct a portion of its capital toward this vertical, focusing on real-time risk detection and “human-in-the-loop” responses—essentially flagging dangerous riding behavior to command centers in real time. The company has not specified how much of its recent $3 million seed round (closed in August 2025) will be allocated to this integration.

The market for safety intelligence

The deal comes as India’s telematics sector attempts to mature beyond simple GPS dots on a map. The market was valued at approximately $1.7 billion in 2024 and is forecast to reach $6.9 billion by 2033. However, video telematics remains a smaller, albeit hotter, slice of that pie, highlighted by Netradyne’s $90 million Series D earlier this year.

While Netradyne and others have cornered the enterprise trucking and fleet market, the two-wheeler segment remains largely fragmented, dominated by basic aftermarket cameras with little to no intelligence. Cautio’s bet is that insurers and logistics aggregators will eventually demand the same level of safety data for bikes that they currently expect for trucks.

“India’s telematics market is moving from tracking to intelligence,” noted a Bangalore-based mobility investor. “The winners will be those who own the risk graph—not just the map.”

Investors and what comes next

The combined entity is supported by a mix of mobility-focused operators and institutional funds. Cautio’s cap table includes Antler India, 8i Ventures, and Venture Catalysts. The angel list is heavy on industry founders, including:

• Gajendra Jangid and Vikram Chopra (CARS24)
• Vivekananda Hallekere (Bounce)
• Nishchay AG (Jar)

Bytes brings in backing from the WTFund, IIT Mandi Catalyst, and NSRCEL–IIM Bangalore.

For Cautio, the immediate challenge will be operational. Scaling hardware installation and maintenance across thousands of two-wheelers is significantly more complex than managing stable four-wheeler fleets. Furthermore, the regulatory landscape regarding on-board recording and AI liability in India remains grey.

However, the strategic intent is clear. By owning the tech stack for both stable fleets and chaotic two-wheeler traffic, Cautio is positioning itself as a full-stack infrastructure provider for Indian road safety.