US-based early stage investor Entrepreneurship & Venture
Capital (EVC) on Monday announced a $50 million fund focused on the Indian
market.
The fund will invest in technology ventures across sectors
such as the Internet of Things (IoT), mobile space, ad-tech, e-commerce,
gaming, wearables and education. The ticket size of the investments would range
from $100,000 to $5million.
“Today, India has emerged as one of the most assuring
entrepreneurial landscapes. We have launched the fund looking at the
opportunities that the Indian ecosystem has to offer and the gap that we can
bridge by supporting new businesses that can put India on the global entrepreneurial
map,” said Anjli Jain, managing partner, EVC.
Jain has over 15 years of experience in the start-up
ecosystem. She has been an entrepreneur as well as an investor.
As an entrepreneur she founded Kryptos Mobile, a
cloud-based, self-service mobile app development and publishing platform in
2012. Other ventures founded by her include BlackBeltHelp, LookingGlass
Platform and OculusIT.
EVC also runs an accelerator programme in Gurgaon where it
provides capital, mentorship and physical and virtual co-working space to
entrepreneurs.
The role of the mentors is to help entrepreneurs transform
their ideas into viable business propositions. The accelerator invests in the
range of $5,000-100,000 in exchange for equity in start-ups.
It runs the accelerator programme in the US market as well.
Seed-stage deals nearly tripled in the first 10 months of
2015 from the previous year, according to VCCEdge, a data service by media firm
VCCircle Network. Until 20 October, there were 24 seed-stage investments worth
$12.6 million, up from nine such deals worth $2.8 million in the same period
the previous year.
In February another early stage investment fund, Kae Capital
said it raised $30 million from existing and new investors as part of its
second fund. The firm will be raising an additional $10 million soon.
