Fundamentum Partnership, the venture capital firm co-founded by Nandan Nilekani, said its flagship growth fund had been generating 35 per cent internal rate of return, performance that had prompted the firm to launch a dual-track investment strategy targeting the country's underserved scale-up market and emerging artificial intelligence sector.
The firm claimed that its Fund II, launched in 2022, has been outperforming most growth-stage funds in India as the country's startup ecosystem matures.
The performance has prompted Fundamentum to split its investment approach between dedicated teams for Series B rounds and deep-technology ventures.
"We are ready to take the next step with a two-pronged strategy under the Fundamentum brand," said Nilekani, who is also general partner at Fundamentum.
"The Indian ecosystem is at an inflection point, we are witnessing both the rapid scaling of growth-stage companies and the emergence of globally competitive AI and DeepTech ventures," he said.
Fundamentum will continue to make new investments from Fund II while actively supporting the existing portfolio as companies advance to their next stage of growth. It is deploying dedicated expertise across these opportunity sets.
The 'scale-up sector-agnostic investing' strategy would be led by Sanjeev Aggarwal, co-founder and general partner. The Indian VC landscape is crowded at the early stages and dominated by global growth funds at the late stages.
The scale-up 'Series B' space is still relatively underserved by specialised investors.
The 'AI and DeepTech' strategy would be led by Ashish Kumar, co-founder and general partner. The practice will focus on spotting opportunities at the right inflection points, irrespective of the stage. It will support entrepreneurs through patient capital and a proprietary tech & data platform.
-- Peerzada Abrar, Business Standard
