ICICI Venture, the private equity arm of ICICI Bank, has announced that it has raised around $190 million in the first phase of its fourth India Advantage Fund.
The total size of the Fourth India Advantage Fund is going to be $500 million. However, with the closure of $190 million in first phase, the firm is planning to start investing in startups right away. According to reports, the firm is going to raise majority of the funding from off-shore investors. The company has revealed that it has received investment commitment from an Asian sovereign wealth fund.
With this fund raising, the firm is now looking to exit from its existing investments through secondaries and strategic asset sales.
The third fund for the firm, which was raised in the year 2009, was mostly raised locally in which it raised around $400 million. In its second fund, it raised $810 million and had raised $245 million to start PE practice in 2003.
It would be interesting to see when and how the firm closes this fourth fund and how much it can raise, as $500 million seems like a bit ambitious given the current slowdown in investment pace.
Besides three sector agnostic funds, ICICI Ventures has raised seven funds to date across different investment themes. It had raised two realty funds, a mezzanine financing fund and a joint special situations investment fund along with Apollo Global.
ICICI Venture has also revealed that it has completed its third partial exit in February as part of initial public offering (IPO) of TeamLease Services Ltd. It had nine companies under its third fund and has managed to fully exit three of them.
Prashant Purker, Managing Director and CEO, ICICI Venture, said,
By growing core practices, our aim is to add more cash reserves that are ready for fresh capital deployment, as opportunities arise. By utilising multiple strategies and going beyond waiting for capital markets for exits, we do secondary deals and strategic sales and have managed to create a strong exits and investments pipeline.
Amid — what general perception says — has been a lowly investment quarter for Indian startups, many venture capital firms are currently looking to raised funds. Infuse Ventures is raising around $150 million under ‘Bharat’ for clean energy sector, while India Quotient is looking to close $20 million fund to invest in early-stage startups. IDG Ventures is also looking forward to close its new fund with $200 million.
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