Nurturing and guiding the entrepreneurial space in India all the while driving economic growth and building a concrete ecosystem; Indian Angel Network’s (IAN) Alpha Fund has announced its first close at Rs 355 crore ($42.5 million). The Alpha Fund is IAN’s second venture capital fund, with a total corpus of Rs 1,000 crore ($119 million).
Commendably, the first close of IAN Fund 2 is higher than the total corpus of IAN Fund 1. IAN’s vision is to catalyse an investment of Rs. 5,000 crore in 500 companies, creating 5,00,000 jobs by 2030.
The Category II SEBI-registered fund has marquee investors like Sidbi (Small Industries Development Bank of India), SRI Fund, and several investors from IAN Fund I.
“Startups are the key engines for employment and economic growth in India, finding solutions for many of our challenges by leveraging technology and innovative business models. The Alpha Fund will be instrumental in achieving our vision of investing in over 500 startups and creating 50,00,000 jobs by 2030, nurturing a thriving ecosystem,” said Saurabh Srivastava, co-founder, Indian Angel Network.
IAN has already invested Rs 900 crore (approx. $108 million) in 250 startups; with an overall valuation of around $9 billion. Its portfolio includes household names such as Spinny, Wow! Momo, and WoodenStreet in the consumer economy, and Uniphore, Druva, and Fareye on the B2B side. Additionally, it has also backed companies in spacetech and cleantech companies, including Dhruva Space, Phool.co, and Zypp Mobility.
More about the Indian Angel Network and Fund II
Founded in 2006 by Padmaja Ruparel, Raman Roy, and Saurabh Srivastava; IAN helps investors diversify their private wealth and invest into seeding and growing startups in the country. With Fund II, IAN revealed that it is looking to invest in cleantech and environment, healthtech, agritech, edtech, fintech; and emerging sectors like industry 4.0, spacetech, Web 3, and robotics.
“With the IAN Alpha Fund, we will be keen on investing in innovative ideas that have the capacity to generate profits and aim to solve real-world problems,” shared Padmaja Ruparel, senior managing partner of IAN.
Led by Ruparel, the Fund II’s primary aim is to invest in startups with high-quality founders solving problems for a large customer base; leveraging technology and models to scale quickly. The fund has experts like Kris Gopalakrishnan, co-founder of Infosys; Sunil Munjal, chairman and managing director (MD), Hero Mindmine & Hero Corporate Services; and CP Gurnani, MD and chief executive officer of Tech Mahindra, on its advisory board.
“We intend to not only focus on India’s metros to harness but also have a keen eye on Tier-II and III cities, where untapped potential and creativity abound and where we have already had some great successes. Female founders will also be an area of focus,” said Ruparel.
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