Early stage venture fund Leo Capital plans to launch a new fund following two successful funds, this news comes hot on the heels as India is set to receive a record $35 billion in venture funding from global investors.
Over the past 3 years, Leo Capital has raised $106m for two funds from investors around the world seeking technology centric opportunities in India and Southeast Asia.
Leo Capital was established by Rajul Garg and Shwetank Verma in 2017. Mr Garg founded Pine Labs (valued at $5 billion in private valuation), GlobalLogic (valued at $10 billion on exit) and Sunstone Education (a business education company in India).
He started angel investing in 2011 before setting up Leo Capital. He was the first investor in Meesho, India’s largest social commerce company.
Mr Verma worked for the investment institution Clermont Group making investments in education and healthcare before joining Metlife Asia where he led work on innovation and partnerships with startups. In between he also founded start up MyHealthMate which was acquired in 2016.
Rajul Garg, managing partner at Leo Capital, said: “Having been a founder several times over, I know first hand the opportunity and challenges startups face. As a team we’re well versed on the early stage signals that matter and are able to quickly engage in opportunities and be the first to write seed stage cheques for these businesses which we know have the right team and plan to scale. We pride ourselves on our track record of having helped build category leading technology companies multiple times.”
“It’s our approach that drew global investors into our first two funds and we quickly became a beacon for investors in the US, Europe and Japan when they first started to internationalise their venture investments. We have feet on the ground and courtesy of our long careers here we are very familiar with the ecosystem”.
India is set to surpass the record level of total investment it saw last year when venture funding totalled $33.8 billion. Indian startups received $26.7 billion in the first three quarters of this year alone, putting the nation on track for well more than $35 billion in investment by the end of 2021.
Since 2014, over 6,500 Indian startups have raised over $81 billion in funding and this is growing exponentially year on year. This includes 66 startups that are in the Unicorn Club (at least a $1 billion valuation), whose combined valuation is $210 billion. This number is set to reach 100 startups by 2023.
