Themes BEHIND CURRENT SEED & ANGEL INVESTMENTS

DIGITAL INDIA

Outcomes-Driven Business Models for Middle India

India's rapidly growing 600M strong middle class is not well served by traditional models in healthcare, education or financial services.

The solutions lie in new tech-enabled, full-stack models which can counter supply fragmentation, and ensure quality outcomes at low price points.

Examples of what we have backed:

  • Full-stack primary healthcare with built-in insurance, at a disruptive price point

  • A platform that combines agri inputs data, content and commerce for farmers, transforming their incomes and lives

  • Completely new UX for new-to-Internet users, turning viewers into transacting customers, with AI assistance all the way to fulfillment

Engagement & Brands for The New Indian Consumer

The New Indian Consumer is a digitally-enabled global citizen who expects quality and authenticity from the brands that she/he engages with, while remaining value-conscious.

India has always had massive brand fragmentation, and the new brands that win will combine aspiration with inspiration, and local identity with a global outlook.

Examples of what we have backed:

  • A “third space” combining the best of coffee culture and community

  • A community and fintech platform focused on modern Indian women

  • Mobile-first social gaming and immersive entertainment for Indian millennials

  • Positive media and an eco-friendly brand for consumers who value sustainability and impact

Digitally Enabling Indian Businesses

As India’s 50 million SMEs rapidly enter the formal economy, digitization is key: driving revenue growth, cost efficiencies, working capital and new financing avenues.

Such tools / platforms have to be built ground up, with a deep understanding of the daily business needs of the Indian SME owner.

Examples of what we have backed:

  • Omnichannel inventory, data and logistics platform for retailers and brands to optimize their supply side

  • An “ERP” for small business owners to simplify their daily workflow

  • Revenue-based financing for new D2C/“challenger brands”

  • A new blockchain to turbocharge transaction flow, from invoicing and POs to receipts

Software: Made in India, for the World

Companies like Zoho and Freshworks have proven that world-class SaaS for global enterprise can be built from India.

Armed with deep domain expertise, capitally efficient product lifecycles and growth hacking playbooks, India’s SaaS entrepreneurs are capturing value globally.

Examples of what we have backed:

  • A real-time sales “co-pilot” and coaching tool enabled by voice AI

  • A “Value SaaS” accelerator scaling capitally efficient, subscription software businesses built out of India

  • A blockchain-enabled HR tech platform for better credential verification, background checks, and meaningful skill endorsements

global deep tech

Deep Tech & Convergence

Data infrastructure is being completely revamped by a convergence of technologies: IoT in the data capture layer, AI in the data learning layer and blockchain in the data settlement / storage layer.

As these technologies mature and gain adoption in tandem, their combined utility will transform the underpinnings of the digital world.

Examples of what we have backed:

  • The world's leading AI data marketplace

  • One of the world's best deep learning teams working on solving the huge consumer need for unified travel planning and booking

  • A prediction market or hedge fund that crowdsources from a decentralized network of the world's leading data scientists

Disrupting Traditional Finance: Decentralization & Digital Assets

A revolution is underway, as decentralized networks increasingly become feature-rich alternatives to the traditional centrally-controlled financial system.

Digital assets and supporting infrastructure can democratize financial products, in terms of everything from access, ownership, trading and more.

Examples of what we have backed:

  • A neobank that can offer the market’s highest-yielding primary account, powered by an invisible decentralized finance backend

  • A team trying to democratize the vast markets for algo trading, enabled by no-code strategy creation, backtesting and deployment tools

  • One of the world's leading platforms for liquidity, digitization and tokenization of privately-held equity

Blockchain and Web 3.0: Fixing the Attention Economy

The Internet 2.0, with its hub-and-spoke architectural paradigm, has created digital oligopolies with massive control over user identities, data and personal information.

In the next few years, the Internet will undergo a massive transformation to Web 3.0 — the Internet of Value and Trust. This is the time to discover the "picks and shovels" — the foundational infrastructure that is being laid already.

Examples of what we have backed:

  • The world's leading project in self-sovereign digital identity — controlled by the user and persistent across the digital world

  • The world's fastest growing browser ecosystem, with built-in ad-blocking, privacy and peer-to-peer value transfer, challenging the control of Google and Facebook

  • Protocols that are privacy-centric and censorship-resistant