SUMMARY
The fund will write off cheques between INR 5 Cr and INR 6 Cr in about 20 startups. It will also earmark a portion of funds for follow-on investments
Prath Ventures has invested in more than 20 seed and growth-stage consumer brands
Some of its portfolio companies include PVR Cinemas, MyGlamm, Sanfe, ManMatters and Vastu, among others
Early-stage venture capital firm Prath Ventures has raised INR 50 Cr as the first closure of its INR 225 Cr fund.
The fund will write off cheques between INR 5 Cr and INR 6 Cr in about 20 startups. It will also earmark a portion of funds for follow-on investments, according to media reports.
Set up in May 2022 by Piyush Goenka and Harmanpreet Singh, the Mumbai-based VC firm has invested in more than 20 seed and growth-stage consumer brands. As per its website, some of its portfolio companies include PVR Cinemas, MyGlamm, Sanfe, ManMatters and Vastu, among others.
So far, the fund has bagged funding from HNIs and some family offices. The VC firm said it is anticipated to see a final closure by the end of 2023 and would see investments from institutional investors.
Talking about its founders, Goenka is presently working as a director at Safari Industries and Arohan Financial. As per their LinkedIn profiles, earlier, he worked with TANO INDIA, IL&FS and Shilpa Medicare. On the other hand, Singh previously worked with Multiples Alternate, ICICI Venture, CRISIL Ltd and SBI Capital Markets.
Notably, the beginning of 2023 has seen a few fund launches along with partial fund closures. For example, today, investment firm Zero To One received SEBI’s approval to form an INR 300 Cr fund. Meanwhile, investment platform Mumbai Angels also rolled out an angel fund and a VC fund to back early-stage startups.
Besides that, earlier this month, Lighthouse Canton marked the first closure of an INR 550 Cr debt fund while Dallas Venture Capital marked the first closure of the INR 350 Cr fund.
The trends are somewhat similar to what we saw in 2022 and we can hope these trends will continue to show their momentum in 2023 as well. According to the Inc42 funding report, in the calendar year 2022, a total of 126 funds were launched. These funds included corporate venture capitals (CVCs), venture capital, angel and debt funds, among others.
The 126 funds cumulatively raised over $18 Bn to shore up the startup ecosystem. Of these, 62% of funds was aimed at early-stage startups meanwhile, 38% directed to growth and late-stage startups.
Besides that, out of the 126 funds, 22% were sector-agnostic funds and the remaining 78% focused on diverse sectors.
