Nisarg Shah-Led Kettleborough VC Closes Its Early Stage-Focussed Maiden Fund At $5 Mn

Angel investor Nisarg Shah-led Kettleborough VC, an India-based venture capital firm, has launched its maiden fund to focus on early stage Indian startups. The VC fund has received capital commitments of $5 Mn from LPs comprising business owners and startup founders. 

With a founder-market fit focus and a concentrated investment strategy, the fund will invest in 8-10 ventures in the next 12 months, the company said in a statement. 

Kettleborough VC will sign cheques of $150K – $300K and also participate significantly in the follow-on rounds of its portfolio companies. 

Launched as a Solo GP (General Partner) Fund in late 2021, the alternate investment fund has so far backed tech-focussed ventures at their seed stages. 

Shah comes from a background of angel investment, having backed 20+ companies like healthtech Phablecare, agritech Otipy, proptech Homecapital, fintech Onebanc, foodtech Bigspoon, and more. Two of the portfolio companies are already valued at over $100 Mn and another two will follow soon.

The current fund is an extension of Shah’s existing work, he said in a statement.

The $5 Mn fund has already been deployed in three companies – enterprise tech Zippmat, adtech Zocket and edtech Bytelearn, and in two undisclosed companies whose rounds are likely to close in October 2022.

“We build up independent conviction on founders and the space they want to operate in at ideation or even before that, bring along relevant partners and help the companies see it through. Our value-additions range from insights on revenue models to getting upstream investors to enabling business partnerships for the companies,” Shah said.

Fund Launches Amid Funding Winter

Kettleborough VC’s maiden fund comes at a time when investors have tightened their purses. Funding within the third quarter of 2022 has more than halved from the previous quarter. According to Inc42 report, on a year-on-year basis, the fall is more than 80% from Q3 2021.

Further, mega rounds ($100 Mn+ rounds) have been the most affected, falling by nearly 90% quarter-on-quarter, and small cheque sizes (mostly in early stage startups) have been a redeeming factor.

Naturally, early stage VC firms are on the rise and in the past quarter, several funds have come to the fore. 

Leo Capital’s third fund marked its first close, Merak Ventures launched a $100 Mn maiden fund, Flipkart’s accelerator program announced to back six early stage startups, Weave Capital launched a $75 Mn fund, First Cheque closed its $5 Mn fund and many more VCs, accelerators and even the government have decided to back innovative startups in their seed and bridge stages.

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