Stride Ventures Announces First Close Of Stride Ventures India Fund II
The firm aims to ramp up deployment in late-stage startups across sectors such as B2B commerce, healthcare, agritech, fintech, and D2C brands with an average ticket size up to INR 75 crore
Stride Ventures, a venture lending fund in India, announced on Wednesday the first close of Stride Ventures India Fund II, securing commitments of INR 550 crore out of its target corpus of INR 1,000 crore, with an additional greenshoe option of INR 875 crore. Having received approval from the Securities Exchange Board of India (SEBI) in June 2021, the firm has been able to raise more than half of its targeted corpus of INR 1,000 crore within two months since the announcement of the launch, amidst significant investor interest.
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The firm will be continuing its strategy of working closely with exceptional founders and fundamentally strong companies backed by leading venture capitalists. The firm aims to ramp up deployment in late-stage startups across sectors like B2B commerce, healthcare, agritech, fintech and D2C brands with an average ticket size upto INR 75 crore.
In addition to family offices and institutional investors, the firm will diversify its investor base outside India for Stride Ventures India Fund II, on the lines of the maiden fund. Amid growing investor confidence and a maturing Indian startup ecosystem, the new fund represents a significant opportunity for the firm to build a robust pipeline of deployments in the coming months, the firm shared.
"The considerable tailwinds seen in the Indian startup ecosystem present a perfect opportunity to invest in the potential of venture debt in India. With the majority of investors from our maiden fund returning to invest in the new fund, we have had a quicker-than-expected first close. Their confidence remains resolute in our mission to build innovative alternate financing solutions for founders to help scale their startups more efficiently," explained Ishpreet Gandhi, founder and managing partner, Stride Ventures.
Previously, Stride Ventures has invested in proven winners including late-stage and growth-stage startups such as Infra.Market, Spinny, HomeLane, SUGAR Cosmetics, Zetwerk, Bizongo, Pocket Aces, MyGlamm, DocsApp etc
Stride Ventures has made disbursals of over INR 400 crores in 2021 through 20 investments. The firm remains on track to announce the final close of the second fund by the end of 2021. With its ability to recycle capital, Stride will effectively have more than INR 3,000 crore for funding startups across the tenure of the fund, the establishment said.
