The biggest challenge for  chatbots is understanding the user's language.  The name of the  game is Natural Language Processing -- and  India   has historically led the world in this area.  No  surprises  therefore,  that even as the big players get their  bot act together, Indians are off the startup block.

Four IIT Kharagpur alumni, Sachin Jaiswal, Keshav Prawasi, Nitin Babel and Shishir Modi, have founded Niki.ai,  a startup,  whose product  Niki,   is  claimed to be the world's first  AI-driven  smart- purchasing  chatbot.  Currently,  the tool enables phone recharging and   cab booking, but Niki will soon cover a wide canvas of services.

AI-plus-chat is also the mix that fuels   MagicX  and its services like grocery ordering, bill payments, travel planning  and phone recharge.  Their Bengaluru-based AI team  draws in experience at IBM, Xerox and IITs.

Helpchat  calls itself "an intelligent personal assistant app that helps you get more things done." They have the widest gamut of services among the Indian  helpchat sites we checked.

"We are changing the way you would get work done - over chat",  says Haptik.co   co-founded by Aakrit Vaish and Swapan Rajdev  both alumni of the University of Illinois, at Urbana-Champaign. Their service  augments automated help with a team of live assistants.
May 2 2016