Indian Angel Network (IAN), a national network of angel investors investing in startups and early-stage ventures, has invested an undisclosed amount in IndiaCollegeSearch, an online search engine for Indian colleges and universities. The investment was done by IAN members Anupam Mittal, Vikram Upadhyaya, and Varun Khurana. The startup was co-founded by Anirudh Motwani and Parul Bansal in 2010, and this is the first time IAN has invested in an incubatee company. As part of the investment, Upadhyaya and Khurana will join the board of the startup.
Indian Angel Network has over 225 members and has funded around 50 startups across sectors like IT, mobile, healthcare and education – both in India and abroad. In 2011, IAN invested over $8 million in 11 startups and last year, this amount increased to $11 million, invested in 17 companies.
Early this month, IAN formed a sub-group called IAN Impact, which will focus on social enterprises addressing the problems of people living at the bottom of the pyramid. IAN Impact will put in up to Rs 2 crore ($333,000) in six early-stage companies per year.
IAN investments this year
July 2013: SnapLion Global Ltd, the company that owns and operates SnapLion.com, an online platform to create sleek, interactive mobile apps for anyone wishing to engage their fans in real time, received undisclosed round of funding from India Internet Group, Blume Ventures, and Rehan Yar Khan-led Orios Venture Partners. Silicon Valley-based investors including Vuclip CEO Nickhil Jakatdar and Piyush Shah, apart from Indian Angel Network members Rajan Anandan, Sandeep Soni and Gaurav Sharma, also participated in the round.
July 2013: Delhi-based social tech company Gram Vaani Community Media Pvt Ltd, whose social platform features voice and video-based local media offerings, raised $500,000 in its first equity investment round from IAN, along with a few unnamed investors.
March 2013: Invested an undisclosed amount in online education company Rank Junction Pvt Ltd which runs RankJunction.com, a ranking platform for competitive exams.
Feb 2013: Invested an undisclosed amount in Seattle-based Mobilewalla, a search portal for mobile apps, with IAN members Rajan Anandan, Venkat Raju and Sharad Sharma leading the investment round. As part of the investment, Raju joined the Mobilewalla board.
Feb 2013: XinLab Inc., which operates under the brand Vuclip, acquired Mumbai and Toronto-based mobile video streaming startup Jigsee in an all-stock deal while early investors Indian Angel Network (IAN) and venture capital firm Sequoia Capital, who had invested in Jigsee two years ago, swapped stake to become shareholders of VC-backed Vuclip.
