Indian early-stage venture capital firm Kae Capital has secured $50 million in the final close of its Winners Fund II (KWF II), to invest in the best companies of its existing portfolio as well as new companies.
The company has made investments in 81 firms, including Porter, Zetwerk, HealthKart, Nazara, and Tata 1mg, and is targeting to invest in another 20 companies through KWF II.
The firm has already invested in HealthKart, Wysa, Brightchamps and Disprz through KWF II.
Founded in 2012, Kae Capital is a sector-agnostic fund that invests in pre-seed to pre-series A stages of a company’s lifecycle. Its typical initial cheque size ranges between $1-3 million.
The fund, which was oversubscribed witnessed participation from Velo Partners, Henry Kravis (Co-founder and Co-executive Chairman, KKR), 360 ONE (formerly IIFL Wealth & Asset Management), Prashant Tandon & Tanmay Saksena (Co-founder/CEO & COO, Tata 1mg), Sameer Maheshwari (Founder, HealthKart), Abhay Soi (Founder, Max Healthcare), Hemendra Kothari (Founder, DSP Group), Yogesh Agrawal (MD, Ajanta Pharma), Sanket & Apurva Parekh (Pidilite), and VM Thapar Family Office.
Last year, Kae Capital had secured the final close of its third fund at Rs 767 crore ($94 million) that saw participation of entrepreneurs such as Rajesh Yabaji (Blackbuck), Ashish Hemrajani (BookMyShow), Nitish Mittersain (Nazara), Srikanth Velamakanni (Fractal Analytics), Deep Kalra (MakeMyTrip), and Jitendra Gupta (Jupiter), among others.
“Being pioneers of early-stage investing in India, we’ve seen the ecosystem grow and see enough merit in being involved for as long as possible in a company’s lifecycle,” Sasha Mirchandani, Partner, Kae Capital, said.
Kae Capital’s fund closure comes even as private equity and venture capital investments into Indian startups have been on a downward trajectory after hitting a peak in Q3 2021.
Early-stage transactions, however, have largely remained unscathed by the funding winter and continue to dominate deal volume in Q2 2023. Pre-seed and seed-stage deals cumulatively raised $192.7 million in the quarter, up 67% from Q1, according to data from DealStreetAsia DATA VANTAGE’s India Deal Review: Q2 2023 report.
Separately, Indian early-stage venture capital fund pi Ventures raised $85 million in the final close of its second fund, 2.5 times more than its predecessor fund, to invest in AI and deeptech startups.