Early-stage venture fund pi Ventures, which invests in disruptive Artificial Intelligence and DeepTech startups, has announced the final close of its second fund with a total commitment of Rs 702 crore (USD 85 Mn), closing well above its base target of Rs 565 crore.
The fund is backed by multiple institutional players such as BII, Nippon India Digital Innovation AIF (NIDIA), Accel, Colruyt, Premji Invest and entrepreneurs & family offices such as Binny Bansal, Varun Alagh, Samit Shetty, Rajesh Ranavat, Anupam Mittal, Hemendra Kothari, Hitesh Oberoi, Ullas Kamath, Deep Kalra, senior leaders from IBM, Facebook and Google among others. SIDBI has also returned as a key investor in pi ventures’ second fund with a commitment of INR 100 Crores from the Fund of Funds for Startups managed by SIDBI. This is nearly ~2.5 times of what FFS had invested in the first fund.
The fund will invest in start-ups focused on disruptive AI and other forms of deep tech across sectors including, but not limited to Spacetech, Biotech, Blockchain and Material Science among others. pi Ventures will continue to focus on early stage (seed/ pre-Series A/Series A) investments via this fund and so far has invested in seven startups – ImmunitoAI, Ottonomy.IO, Silence Laboratories, Preimage, Zero Cow Factory and two other ventures. The fund plans to invest in 20-25 such startups in the coming two to three years,
“We are pleased to reaffirm our commitment to pi Ventures as Fund II continues to focus on investing in AI and deep tech-led business models that will help foster technological innovation in key development areas” said Chirantan Patnaik, Director, Venture Capital, British International Investments.
“We are very excited to get to the final close in our second fund. It will enable us to back bold entrepreneurs solving global fundamental problems using innovative technology. India is a great place to build deeptech companies. We are privileged to have a role to play in the journey to put India on the deeptech map of the world.” said Manish Singhal, Founding Partner, pi Ventures.
