The combination of rupee and dollar capital was entirely raised from high net-worth individuals and family offices from India and abroad. The remaining amount will be raised from institutional investors.
The deep-tech focused investment firm is expecting a final close within the next six months, Manish Singhal, founding partner, Pi Ventures told ET. The fund size includes $75 million of base capital and a $25 million green shoe option.
The company received approval for the new fund from capital markets regulator, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi), in April last year. The firm has backed companies such as Agnikul, Locus, Wysa among others through its first fund.
It will now look to invest in about 20-25 startups through the new capital raise.
“With triple the size of our first fund that we raised five years ago, the second fund will help us invest in more companies and support them through three to four rounds,” Singhal said.
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Founded in 2016 by Singhal, Pi Ventures said it will continue to back companies in the early stage (seed, pre-Series A and Series A) companies and focus beyond digital deep-tech startups to space technologies, material sciences, biotech and life sciences.
Pi Ventures invests between $500,000 and $1 million in startups in its first engagement, which could potentially go up to $2 million during follow-on pre-Series A or Series A rounds.
It had CDC UK, IFC World Bank, SIDBI, Sunil Kant Munjal’s family office, Electronic Development Fund, Hero Electronix’s corporate financing arm, In Colour Capital, Accel and entrepreneurs such as Binny Bansal, Bhupen Shah, Raghuveer Tarra and Ullas Kamath as Limited Partners in Fund I, ET reported earlier.
An increasing number of India-focused funds have raised larger pools of capital in the last 12-18 months. Firms such as 3one4 Capital, Chiratae, A91 Partners, Stellaris, Epiq Capital, Blume VC, IIFL PE, Trifecta Capital and Edelweiss PE have either closed or launched new funds recently.
