With A Focus On Corporate Governance, Indian Startups Have Potential To Generate 100 Million New Jobs, Says Rajan Anandan
He also expressed the concerns on the changing market growth dynamics with high inflation and interest rates
By Teena Jose •
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Rajan Anandan, managing director, Sequoia Capital, reportedly, said that the Indian startups have the potential to generate 100 million new jobs. He was speaking at an event organized by Microsoft. He also said that there is a need to focus on corporate governance in Indian startups to build world class companies. The statement comes in line with the recent corporate governance issues in Sequoia funded startups, BharatPe and Zillingo.
"The last thing that has really come to light over the last 3 to 7 months is corporate governance. The Indian ecosystem is now entering a new phase. To build world class companies, you have to have world class corporate governance. We have been very focused on helping our founders understand what it takes to put in place the processes, the systems, the discipline, to actually have a company that will evolve into a company that has world class corporate governance," said Anandan in a statement.
As per a recent blogpost by the venture capital firm, expressing the disappointment when some of its portfolio companies were being investigated for potential fraudulent practices or poor governance, it is said that the firm usually stands shoulder to shoulder with startup founders during their hard times but it goes through deep pain when it hears about the breaches of integrity or ethics in their portfolio companies.
Stating the concerns on the changing market growth dynamics with high inflation and interest rate, he said, "Public market valuation always drives private market valuations and as a result gets massive amounts of capital that came into the startup ecosystems around the world, in US, India and even in China. Actually, despite all the challenges, last year there was over $130 billion worth of startup funding that went into the Chinese ecosystem."
He also added that startup funding in India jumped from about $10 billion in 2020 to $40 billion in 2021. "The environment has changed because inflation is at an all-time high, the interest rates are going up. So, we expect that the Fed will actually pull back, the US government will pull back a lot of the $7 trillion that went to the economy," Anandan said.
According to reports, Indian startups have raised $42 billion in 2021, up from $11.5 billion in 2020.
