The US-based global venture capital fund Clearstone Venture is increasing its exposure to the Indian market. The firm has decided to invest at least Rs 225 crore in four Indian companies in the current fiscal. It has already initiated discussions with a handful of companies in the on-line educational, entertainment and financial services verticals for the stake purchase.
Clearstone Ventures Partners managing director Sumant Mandal told ET: “We are in talks with few potential entrepreneurs and will invest around $10 million in each of these firms. VC funding is a challenge here in India due to regulatory hurdles. Moreover, Indian stock markets have not yet matured,” Mr Mandal added.
Clearstone Ventures has invested in over a dozen US-based companies with back-end operations in India. Also, it has pumped in funds in nearly 30 active portfolio companies as the lead investor with a 15-40 per cent stake in each of them.
In June 2006, Clearstone along with SBI, invested $7.5 million in BillDesk, the county’s leading payments service provider. Its second deal was an investment of $5 million in Bangalore-based mobile handset solutions firm DigiBee Microsystems in January 2007 and about $5 million in Games2win India in March 2007. Clearstone has also invested in eToys, Overture, PayPal, United Online, MP3.com and Elbee.
“This is the right time to invest in the Indian companies as a VC investor. The stock market has slows down and valuations have gone down too,” said Rahul Khanna, director of Clearstone Venture. VC funds have invested $340 million in 51 deals in the first half of 2008. The second quarter alone saw investment of $238 million through 17 deals which is 120 per cent rise over a year-ago period.
Source: Economic Times