Good Morning,
On Tuesday, venture capital firm Accel announced its seventh fund for India. At $650 million, Accel's latest fund is its single-largest one yet for early-stage tech ventures in India and Southeast Asia.
Apart from this, Accel has a $1.7-billion Growth Fund, and a $2.3-billion Leaders Fund, a vehicle that has backed late-stage companies from India like Eruditus, Swiggy, and BrowserStack.
Interestingly, the market value of Accel's portfolio of companies from India crossed the $100-billion mark when it launched its seventh fund in February 2022. This is a 2.5 times growth over the market value of its companies when it closed its last fund in 2019.
In this interview with YourStory, Accel's Shekhar Kirani, Anand Daniel, and Barath Shankar Subramanian throw light on how it built the seventh fund amidst the pandemic, the bright spots in India's digital economy — and what has remained constant in Accel's India journey. Read more.
The Interview
In just a few days, we will come to the end of this financial year. The past year has been tough and turbulent amid COVID-19 but there were glimmers of triumph as well with a record number of unicorns and successful IPOs.
Business leaders across the spectrum discuss their journeys, their past year, financial highs and lows and what went behind making the year, what it was.
Editor’s Pick: App Friday
Quick commerce newbie Zepto raised $160 million within three months on the promise of delivering groceries in under 10 minutes. YourStory’s reporters tested the app across Mumbai, Delhi, and Bengaluru to see if it lives up to its promise. Read more.
Credit: YourStory Design
Ushering in Industrial Revolution 4.0
With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, businesses realised they cannot go on as they wish to without leveraging technology, accelerating its faster adoption.
India is ushering in a ‘new industrial revolution,’ defined by the use of Internet of Things (IoT), connectivity, artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), automation, advanced engineering, and many more technologies.
Going a step further is Hyderabad-based Grene Robotics, which has built a platform for hyper-automation and autonomous decision-making. Read more.
News & Updates
- Tech upskilling startup Scaler (by InterviewBit) has acquired online learning platform AppliedRoots for $50 million to strengthen its Data Science, AI, and ML offering. In 2021, the startup acquired Coding Minutes and Coding Elements.
- According to a report by Oxford Economics, YouTube's growing creator ecosystem contributed Rs 6,800 crore to the Indian GDP and supported 6,83,9001 full-time equivalent jobs in India in 2020. The number of YouTube channels in India with over 100,000 subscribers is now at 40,000.
- Integrated manufacturing solutions company Sanmina and Reliance Strategic Business Ventures Limited (RSBVL), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Reliance Industries Limited (RIL), have entered into an agreement to create a joint venture through investment in Sanmina’s existing Indian entity.
- IndiaMART has announced a lead investment of Rs 170.1 million in SMB-focused SaaS startup, Zimyo Consulting. The investment is part of IndiaMART’s long-term objective of offering various software solutions to improve the ease of doing business for Indian businesses.
- Ninjacart Co-founder and CEO Thirukumaran Nagarajan announced on LinkedIn that the agritech giant will help startups in the sector get seed-funded in two days flat.
Before you go, stay inspired with…
Kunal Shah wants to make a conscious effort to hire 'more diverse'.
“Leadership is building people to build. Many mistake it as using people to build.”
— Kunal Shah, Founder and CEO, CRED
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