Venture capital firm Kalaari Capital’s seed programme, KStart Capital, is hiring Revant Bhate, entrepreneur-in-residence at food delivery firm Faasos, as partner, according to a media report.
Bhate will join KStart later this month and will focus on investments, The Economic Times reported, citing people it didn’t identify. He will join Muthiah Venkateswaran as a partner at KStart.
An email sent to Kalaari Capital did not elicit any response till this article was filed.
This appointment comes after Bala Srinivasa and Prashanth Aluru, partners at Kalaari Capital, resigned from the venture capital firm last month.
Bhate had joined Faasos in 2012 as chief financial officer and was named chief marketing officer in 2015, according to his LinkedIn profile. He had been serving as the head of new business at Faasos since last year.
Prior to Faasos, he worked at investment bank Elara Capital. He has also had stints with private lenders Yes Bank, Citibank and Oracle Corp unit Oracle Financial Services. He is a graduate of the University of Mumbai and the Indian Institute of Management, Kozhikode.
KStart
KStart was launched last year by Kalaari Capital as its seed and incubation programme. It planned to invest about $20 million (around Rs 135.7 crore) in 40 startups over two years.
The programme also has a tie-up with Google, Kalaari Capital had said last year. Under this partnership, Google would select a few KStart portfolio companies for grants of up to $50,000. The partnership will provide select KStart portfolio companies access to Google’s mentorship, extensive global network and products.
KStart’s latest investment was in Hyderabad-based medical transportation startup StanPlus in October.