Technology-focused venture capital firm Ankur Capital has raised Rs 330 crore ahead of an interim close of its second fund. The total target size of the fund is around Rs 350 crore, with an option to retain another Rs 50 crore depending on investor interest, its co-founders said. We have received commitments worth Rs 330 crore from our existing as well as new investors,” said Ritu Verma, one of the co-founders.
With the rapid adoption of new technologies and digitization, emerging markets like India will see more non-English speaking and first-time users migrate online, creating fresh opportunities for more sophisticated and robust tech business models around these next billion users. Ankur Capital’s core strategy, to invest in entrepreneurs solving real-world problems using innovative technologies for large-scale impact, aligns with this paradigm shift in how markets are being accessed. Building on their expertise, Fund II will continue to see a focus on agtech, health tech, fintech, edtech, local language technologies, and deeptech solutions. Ritu Verma, Co-founder and Managing Partner at Ankur Capital shares, “India is in a unique position to build companies for the next billion users (NBU) that are also globally relevant. We are witnessing a distinct set of companies that are using India’s large and diverse markets to test products before launching abroad. As with Fund I, we are happy to accelerate this trend with Fund II.”
“BIRAC is pleased to partner with Ankur Capital under its Fund of Funds scheme – AcE – to support biotech innovations. We look forward to venturing funds like AcE Fund Partner – Ankur Capital and encourage private equity mobilization into the biotech innovation ecosystem. This will benefit the rapidly expanding pipeline of biotech startups who develop technology-led innovative products to address unmet needs for India and the world”, said Dr. Manish Diwan, Head – Strategy Partnership & Entrepreneurship Development at BIRAC.
Ankur Capital as one of a select group of major investments that advance the goals of the global Catalytic Capital Consortium initiative” said Debra Schwartz, Managing Director of Impact Investments at the MacArthur Foundation. “A powerful example of catalytic capital, Ankur’s focus on transformative technology has the potential to improve economic opportunity for low-income individuals across India.”
Ankur Capital’s Fund I backed 14 startups, including tech innovators such as Cropin, String Bio, Niramai, BigHaat, and Jiny. In addition to providing equity capital, Ankur partners with the founders, providing technical assistance, training, and support in strategic planning, executive mentoring, finance, marketing, talent acquisition, and operations. They also recently launched Ankur GRO, an initiative to formalize their Capital Plus approach.
With Fund II, Ankur Capital aims for entry at the seed stack rounds and targets investments of between USD 0.5 million to USD 5 million into each company They intend to invest in 16-18 companies, having already invested in 4 companies.
