OYO, Udaan Backer BlackSoil Boosts Leadership Team With 5 Key Appointments

Alternative credit platform BlackSoil, which counts ideaForge, Upstox, Bluestone, OYO, Udaan, Zetwerk and Curefoods among its portfolio companies, has bolstered its senior leadership team with five appointments to drive growth across investment, fundraising and human resources verticals.

As part of BlackSoil’s new hirings, Aditya Sarda and Vaibhav Nigam joined as the senior vice presidents of investments, while Somaira Khan has been tapped as the senior vice president of human resources.

Apart from that, Prashant Pulipaka and Nikhil Hegde joined as senior vice presidents of fundraising.

With over 19 years of experience across investment and strategy, Sarda was the chief financial officer at ecommerce roll up startup 10club and was also associated with Yes Bank and Citigroup.

Nigam, with over 18 years of experience in financial structuring and risk management, had served in senior positions at Alternative Asset Groups at Kotak Mahindra Bank, IndusInd Bank and Yes Bank.

Khan, with over 15 years of experience in HR, had worked with Emirates National Bank of Dubai and others. 

Pulipaka, with over 20 years of experience in investor relations and fundraising, held senior roles at Edelweiss Alternative Asset and others.

Hegde, with over 15 years of experience, was True Beacon’s business development head in the GCC region and India and chief executive of Small Bus Hospitality.

Ankur Bansal, cofounder and director at BlackSoil, said, “The onboarded individuals with their vast experience and proven track record in their respective domains will drive our strategic initiatives forward. With their expertise, we are confident in our ability to continue delivering value to our investors, stakeholders and portfolios.”

This comes days after BlackSoil NBFC raised equity of INR 100 Cr from its existing Indian investors and family offices through a rights issue. 

Founded in 2016 by Bansal, BlackSoil is an alternative credit platform comprising an NBFC and AIF. It provides customised alternative credit solutions to growth companies, financial institutions, NBFCs and MSMEs across diverse sectors.

BlackSoil is backed by marquee investors and family offices of Allcargo Logistics, Navneet Education, Mahavir Agency, and Mathew Cyriac-led Florintree Advisors.

The company claims to have surpassed INR 5,000 Cr disbursement across 214 deals by December 2023 at the group level. 

BlackSoil claims to have logged AUM growth of around 30% YoY in CY 2023. With around a 30% YoY increase in investment, it deployed INR 1650 Cr across 63 deals and exited from over 20 deals.

In April last year, BlackSoil secured $25 Mn in funding from multiple banks, family offices, corporate treasuries, and high-net-worth individuals, through its various debt products.

Before that in 2022, BlackSoil raised INR 250 Cr (around $30 Mn) debt funding from family offices, UHNIs/HNIs and investment institutions to target mid and growth-stage startups via its debt products.

BlackSoil earlier said its portfolio investment reached more than $30 Mn in the third quarter of FY24, a 35 per cent growth (year-on-year). The VC firm exited six deals and strategically invested in six new deals in Q3 FY24. In the nine months that ended in December 2023, BlackSoil achieved a total portfolio deployment of more than $110 Mn.

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