Venture capital firm Capria Ventures, on Friday, said that it has marked the final close of its India Opportunity Fund at Rs 153 crore (around $19 million).
The US-based VC player made the first close of its India Opportunity Fund at Rs 75 crore in February 2023. To be sure, the India Opportunity Fund was announced originally as Unitus Ventures India Opportunity Fund before Capria and Unitus joined forces to operate as a single brand, Capria, in September last year.
The India Special Opportunity Fund’s corpus is likely to deploy the capital in follow-on bets for winners from the first two funds. Some of Capria’s existing portfolio includes Awign, BetterPlace, Cuemath, Eduvanz, and Masai.
The firm typically invests in early and early-growth stage startups in the global South (India, Latin America, Africa, and Southeast Asia) across a range of sectors, including fintech, jobtech, edtech, agtech, climate and SaaS.
Capria is also investing from its second fund, which has a corpus of $100 million. It made the first close of its second fund in April last year. The firm is planning to invest around 60% of the vehicle in India.
The final close of its India Opportunity Fund comes in the backdrop of the firm making an exit from on-demand work fulfilment platform Awign. Capria and other investors in Awign have sold their stake in a buyout move to Japanese conglomerate Mynavi Corporation.
“Mynavi’s acquisition of Awign not only opens untapped markets and opportunities for the company but is also a great exit for our India Fund II, where we will return more than 50% of the invested capital through this one exit. The multiple on invested capital for Awign for our India Fund II is over 7x,” said Surya Mantha, managing partner at Capria.
“Additionally, our now closed India Opportunity Fund, which also invested in Awign in February 2023, will return more than 20% of the invested capital to its LPs,” Mantha added.
Capria helps activate relationships between founders and local VC firms in the tech hubs of the global south—from Sao Paulo to Lagos to Bengaluru to Jakarta. Capria’s family of funds collectively manage assets exceeding $200 million. Capria has offices in Seattle, Bengaluru, Nairobi and Washington DC. Its India portfolio includes Betterplace, BharatAgri, Eduvanz and Edenfarm.
