Infosys Innovation Fund Invests $4.6 Mn in Stellaris Venture Partners

IT services company Infosys has announced to invest $4.6 Mn (INR 31.6 Cr) in Bengaluru based early-stage venture capital firm Stellaris Venture Partners. This investment is towards the first close of Stellaris’ fund and is in the form of Limited Partner (LP) interest, being routed through its Innovation Fund.

It is a $500 Mn fund by Infosys, floated in January last year to invest in Artificial Intelligence (AI), automation, pervasive connectedness as well as collaboration and design technologies. Earlier, under this fund, Infosys invested in Silicon Valley based early-stage venture capital firm Vertex Ventures last year.

Ritika Suri, Executive Vice President & Global Head of Corporate Development & Ventures at Infosys said, “We believe Stellaris with their extensive operational and domain expertise in enterprise software and services in both India and US, is uniquely positioned to leverage India’s capital efficient talent pool, to harness the next wave of enterprise innovation in India. With this investment we look forward to gaining early access to innovative new companies in India that are inventing the future of enterprises globally,.”

The investment from the Innovation Fund is expected to complete by December 15, 2016.

Stellaris Venture Partners was launched in early 2016 by by former Helion Venture Partners executives Ritesh Banglani, Alok Goyal and Rahul Chowdhri.

It is an early stage venture fund with investment focus in global SaaS, applications for Indian small and mid-size business (SMBs) and consumers in large verticals such as healthcare, education, financial services and retail.

Stellaris’ investment team has experience working in global technology companies and a strong track record in venture capital, with investments made in companies such as cab hailing firm TaxiForSure, which was acquired by Ola, and online grocer BigBasket.

In September 2016, early stage venture capital firm YourNest launched its $45 Mn second fund, YourNest India Fund II. In October 2016, Ventureast Fund Advisors also announced the first close of its sixth fund, raising $83 Mn.