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In a bid to spot more fundable product start-ups here in India, Palo Alto, California-headquartered venture capital firm Artiman Ventures is building its focus around what it calls an entrepreneur-in-residence (EIR) programme. The firm, which likes to invest in early-stage “white market opportunities”—emerging sectors with few existing players—in the product space, is setting up an incubation centre within its office and has signed up three teamsso far. “We have seen extremely good (business plan) proposals, but very few people with exposure to product-marketing, so we want to stimulate more fundable plans,” says M.J. Aravind, a partner at Artiman, declining details on the in-house teams or the product areas they are working on. While programmes built around resident entrepreneurs are not new, it has been implemented selectively among VCs and has been a practice more common among large companies aiming to increase the reach of their technologies and services. […]
Special lectures, courses planned for aspiring entrepreneurs. Venture capital (VC) and private equity (PE) firms appear to have caught the fancy of business schools this year. Be it for creating awareness among aspiring entrepreneurs to raise funds, or merely understaning the operations of a VC/PE firm, management institutes have increasingly begun interacting with the industry. While some have announced setting up of a PE club for aspiring entrepreneurs, others are planning courses, special lectures and seminars to create awareness about the booming sector. Students of the Post Graduate Programme for Executives (PGPX) at Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A), will go through a course on PE in their last term between December and February. […]
Even with high inflation, a progressively weakening rupee and slower growth estimates, the venture capital industry in India continues to grow exponentially. Close to $1 billion worth of deals took place last year and about $340 million worth of deals have already been closed this year. A research report by Deloitte released during a recent meet of the Venture Capital Association of India says VCs invested $158 million in just 26 deals between April- June this year. This includes new emerging fields such as film production, education and logistics this year. […]
Until recently, the world's biggest movie machine, the Indian film industry, had gained an unsavoury reputation because of suspect funding sources, back-room deals and the general lack of transparency in the movie-making process. But this notion changed after films were given 'industry' status and legitimate or 'white' funds started pouring in. Today, you have the who's who of the corporate world—such as Anil Ambani and the Mahindras—entering the business for its growth prospects. VC funds are expected to bring in high standards of corporate governance into the film industry as they demand more accountability from producers and ensure that the project is completed as per the plan. […]
Workshop on HEDGE FUNDS INVESTMENT AND RISK ANALYSIS will be held on 20-21 October 2008in Singapore. […]
A slowdown in private equity(PE) dealmaking in India has not altered the plans of new PE firms including some bulge-bracket funds to set shop here. The latest to join the group is US billionaire Leon Black’s Apollo Management, which has appointed an Indian expat based at its UK unit to head the Indian operations. The firm joins a group of fund houses such as European buyout major Candover, Englefield Capital and Babcock & Brown. While a few of these new players have roped in the talent available within the country to head their businesses, others are bringing executives from across the shores. US-based Apollo Management has appointed one of its partners from the UK unit, Mintoo Bhandari, to head the India operations. According to sources, he is in the process of putting together a team in Mumbai. Globally, Apollo is estimated to have an asset base of more than $20 billion. Its portfolio includes companies like Linens n Things, the second largest home furnishing retail chain in the US, besides AMC Entertainment, which is America’s second largest theatre chain, and Countrywide (UK). It focuses on underperforming companies and distressed assets. Some of the sectors in which it has invested include chemicals, supply chain management, BPO, media, healthcare and transport. […]
While foreign portfolio investors have been selling stocks of Indian companies, overseas venture capitalists continue to invest in Indian assets. In a sharp contrast to foreign institutional investors (FIIs) selling shares worth Rs 15,000 crore in the first quarter, foreign venture capital (FVC) investors have invested close to Rs 17,000 crore in Indian assets during the April-June quarter. The spurt in foreign venture capital investments has been attributed to dipping asset prices, the presence of more India-dedicated venture funds, besides the slide in the stock market. While IT companies continue to account for a majority of foreign venture capital investments, the proportion of non-IT investments — both by activity and value — has gone up. […]
A tightening bias of monetary policy, slowing demand and growing liquidity concerns, could have a negative impact on the credit profiles of Indian real estate companies, says a report by rating agency Fitch. The slowdown would mainly affect the smaller real estate companies while increasing the relative strength of some large players, the report said.The prolonged slowdown could also reduce the appetite of private equity, it said. […]
The year 2008 began keeping pace with the heightened deal activity in 2007 and saw the completion of the much anticipated Tata Motors’ acquisition of the two marque brands Jaguar and Land Rover for $2.3 billion from Ford Motors. However, the downturn in the global and domestic economies seems to have impacted India’s M&A scenario. While the total number of transactions fell from 663 in the first half (H1) of 2007 to 467 in H1 2008, the total deal value saw a sharp slump, dipping by over 40% from US$38.4 billion in H1 2007 to US$21.4 billion in H12008. The sectors which have been driving the strategic M&A activity include Pharmaceuticals, IT&ITeS , Banking & Financial Services (BFSI) and Real Estate. The outbound investments accounted for US$ 8.2 billion of M&A activity spread over 96 deals. (Sanjeev Krishan : The author is a director at PWC) […]
With the growing stress on climate change, foreign institutional investors (FIIs) and private equity investors will soon take investment decisions based on the socio-environmental performance of domestic companies. Globally, the trend is already visible with the Carbon Disclosure Project with nearly $60 billion assets under management evaluating companies against the criteria of triple bottom line (environmental, social and economic parameters). Responding to calls from investors, the Johannesburg Stock Exchange launched the first of its kind exchange in an emerging market, the Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) index where it lists companies, which meet certain socio-environmental criteria, and are also evaluated on these parameters. The earnings to India from carbon credit is pegged between $0.5 billion to up to $1 billion per annum depending on how the carbon prices move, for the next 10-15 years […]
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