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Our Bureau

Bangalore , Oct. 22

Garnett & Helfrich Capital, a private equity firm specialising in venture buyouts, has said that it is expanding its Indian operations and announced an investment in mobile firm Celunite Inc, which has an Indian presence.

Celunite, with development centres in Hyderabad and Pune, provides Linux-based open mobile platform software and services for the mobile industry.

Garnett & Helfrich said that it has acquired controlling stake in Celunite, but did not disclose the transaction details.

"India is a hub of technology innovation and talent. Thus, it is critical that we continue to expand our portfolio companies' presence in the region by helping them build partnerships, recruit local talent and identify and evaluate acquisition targets,"

Mr Terry Garnett, Managing Director of Garnett & Helfrich, told newspersons.

"We will leverage our Mumbai operations to identify new investments in leading technology sectors," he added.

Garnett & Helfrich, which currently operates a $350-million fund focused exclusively on the emerging venture buyout segment for mid-size technology spin-outs, is in the process of raising a fresh $850-million fund, he said.

Potential targets

The company would look at 3-4 investments a year and potential targets include business with ongoing annual revenues in the $50-200 million zone.

Apart from product companies, it is keen on adding services companies to its portfolio.

The Celunite transaction is Garnett & Helfrich's fourth and most recent venture buy-out investment.

Earlier investments were in Wyse Technology, Ingres (an open source enterprise database company spun out from Computer Associates) and Blade Network Technologies, a supplier of network infrastructure divested from Nortel Networks.

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