Accel Elevates Pratik Agarwal, Rachit Parekh To The Role Of Partner

VC firm Accel has promoted two of its principals, Pratik Agarwal and Rachit Parekh, to the role of partner. 

“Today, we’re proud to announce the promotion of Pratik Agarwal and Rachit Parekh to Partner,” Accel said in a post on X. Both Agarwal and Parekh have been associated with the VC firm for nearly six years. 

The promotion comes at a time when Accel is deepening its presence across the globe and is focussing on emerging technologies like GenAI.

“With their elevation, our partnership grows stronger—broader in perspective, deeper in insight, and more attuned to the future we’re building together,” Accel added.

Agarwal is a board member of startups like Credgenics, Fashinza, Citymall, Spyne and Nymble, as per his LinkedIn profile. 

Meanwhile, Parekh, who looked after growth stage investments, participated in the funding rounds of Niyo (Series C), Amagi (Series D and Series E) and Swiggy (Series J), as per his profile.

The promotions also come at a time when Accel is bullish on the Indian startup ecosystem. In January this year, the VC firm raised $650 Mn for its eighth India fund. It said in a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing that the capital was secured from 131 undisclosed investors.

The firm counts Indian unicorns like Moneyview, Flipkart, Swiggy and Moglix in its portfolio. 

Accel first entered India in 2005, and started investing with the Accel India Venture Capital Fund worth $10 Mn. It has funded many well-known Indian companies in their early stages, with Flipkart and Freshworks being two of the biggest success stories. 

Accel’s most recent investments were in speciality chemical manufacturing startup Scimplify and 10-minute food delivery startup Swish. While Scimplify secured $40 Mn in its Series B funding round co-led by Accel and Bertelsmann Investments last month, Swish raised $2 Mn in a seed funding round led by Accel in November last year. 

Besides, it was reported last month that Mumbai-based healthtech startup Truemeds is looking to raise INR 375.2 Cr in a fresh funding round to be led by Accel India VII (Mauritius) Ltd.

Accel’s recently announced eighth fund had the highest investment corpus among the 23 VC funds launched for Indian startups in the first quarter of 2025. The Silicon Valley-based investment firm was followed by Bessemer Venture Partners with its $350 Mn fund for early stage startups and PE firm Avendus’ Future Leaders Fund (FLF) III with the same target corpus for late stage startups. 

Notably, VC funds worth over $3.2 Bn were launched in the March quarter to back Indian startups, as per Inc42’s ‘Indian Tech Startup Funding Report, Q1 2025’.