Rajeev Chandrasekhar-promoted Jupiter Capital has joined the likes of Wipro and Infosys Technologies, which have launched private equity funds — globally referred to as the family office funds, made famous by the Rockefeller, Rothschild and Ford in the US.
The trend began in India with Azim Premji, the billionaire owner of Wipro who floated a $1-billion fund in India. Chandrasekhar, who exited BPL Mobile three years ago, is now mulling a $150-million private equity fund, which will probably be launched in association with an established private equity fund.
Recently, N S Raghavan, among the co-founders of Infosys Technologies, took this route by aligning with an investment banking boutique to manage his family office fund.
According to sources in the PE segment, a number of private equity funds have initiated discussions with Jupiter Capital for a joint venture or a joint fund. “A number of funds have approached us. We are yet to take a call on this,” said a company official.
However, sources in the industry said that the discussions for a joint fund are at an advanced stage and a $150 million (Rs 500-Rs 600 crore) fund is expected to be announced.
The sources further indicated that this would be a sector agnostic fund and will be growth-oriented. Jupiter officials however declined to confirm the corpus or the focus of the fund.
Chandrasekhar’s Jupiter Capital since mid-2005 has been directly incubating and growing business spanning across media, entertainment, hospitality, software, rail and aviation infrastructure through the holding firm Jupiter Capital. While Chandrasekhar himself oversees these firms along with a core team of advisors, professional managers run each of these business.
This trend of family office funds, being started by established entrepreneurs, is starting to take shape in India after such funds have long established themselves in the US. While Premji’s and Raghavan’s are the two notable funds, a host of other families also manage their funds on their own, without institutionalising it.
With investments in Indian privately-held companies giving returns of around 20 per cent to private equity investors, the established family offices of the US are starting to invest in Indian companies.
Recently, New York-based $1-billion Berggruen Holdings, which manages the funds of the Berggruen family, set up its India operations with $300 million allocated towards real estate, education and hospitality.
Source: Business Standard