SoftBank India Sees Major Exit As Operating Partner Vikas Agnihotri Leaves

SoftBank India has seen a significant exit as Vikas Agnihotri, an operating partner who worked closely with Paytm ahead of its IPO in 2021, has exited the investment fund. 

According to an ET report, Agnihotri left SoftBank in September. It needs to be clarified if he has taken up a new role yet.

Agnihotri’s LinkedIn profile also shows he was associated with SoftBank until September this year.

The Mumbai-based executive worked with Google till February 2020, where he was the managing director for sales in India. Agnihotri joined SoftBank after this as its first operating partner to work with the investor’s portfolio firms in India. 

At Google, he is also believed to have worked closely with Rajan Anandan, now the MD of Peak XV Partners. Before his brief stint at Google, Agnihotri was the CEO of Religare Macquarie Private Wealth Management.

He is also a member of the boards of several major companies in SoftBank’s India portfolio, including FirstCry, GlobalBees and InMobi. However, sources cited by ET noted that Agnihotri is expected to transition out of his board roles in the coming months. He resigned from eyewear giant Lenskart’s board in September, around the same time as his exit from SoftBank.

Inc42 has reached out to Agnihotri and SoftBank on the development and the story will be updated upon receiving their responses. 

Agnihotri’s exit comes as the storied Japanese tech investor has been booking profits by selling its stake in listed Indian tech startups. This month alone, SoftBank sold a stake in PB Fintech and Zomato, completely exiting the latter.

Sumer Juneja, the firm’s managing partner and head for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, said in August that the Japanese conglomerate made more than $5.5 Bn in exits from its India portfolio since it began operations in November 2018 in Mumbai. He added that the late stage investor realised $1.5 Bn from exits in the past 12 to 18 months. 

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