Tech start up accelerator GSF India has appointed Silicon Valley-based investor Vispi Daver as a venture partner.
“Vispi is a strategic thinker and an accomplished investor based in the Silicon Valley. He has been advising GSF and its startups for the last two years. He has invested in two startups (Browntape and Whatfix) from GSF portfolio and has also joined the boards of both the companies. With him taking on Venture Partner role with GSF, we are strengthening GSF platform further,” said Rajesh Sawhney, founder of GSF.
GSF is looking at expanding its presence across countries like Germany, Singapore and the US. The key angels with GSF include Kae Capital’s Sasha Mirchandani, Komli Media’s CEO Prashant Mehta, SAIF Partners’ Ravi C Adusumalli, One97 Communications’ Vijay Shekhar Sharma, People Group’s founder Anupam Mittal and iXiGO.com’s co-founder Aloke Bajpai.
Daver launched his own seed stage venture programme recently. He sits on the board of three portfolio companies in India—Lybrate (mobile healthcare), Browntape (e-commerce, GSF Batch II startup), and whatfix (enterprise SaaS, GSF batch III startup). Prior to this Daver was with Sierra Ventures, a technology focused VC fund, where he was responsible for software investments in the US and in India. His investments in India include MakeMyTrip, CarWale and Seedfund. He holds an MBA in Strategy and Finance from Yale University.
A venture partner at the firm is either be a person with a background of setting up a startup or an executive with deep domain expertise or an investor with networks in global geographies relevant to GSF portfolio companies. The partner is responsible for helping GSF diligence deals during the selection of cohorts and takes on board responsibilities in some of its portfolio companies. GSF’s existing venture partners are Phanindra Sama (founder of Redbus), Manish Dalal (CEO of Verisign India) and NishKaam Mehta (Head, Mobile Strategy, Hulu).
GSF Accelerator has funded 34 startups in three cohorts so far since its inception in 2012. Its portfolio companies include SharedCab, Overcart, HackerEarth, Gamezop, Playselfie, Rentongo.com and Newsbytes.