8i Ventures, an early-stage VC fund launched 8i Fund II of $50 million, with a sharp investment focus on nurturing consumer-tech and fintech companies in India. The Fund II comes on the back of Fund I of $13 million which was raised in 2020. 8i’s Fund I was a successful debut VC fund with multiple category winners in its portfolio including Slice Card, M2P, EaseBuzz and Blue Tokai. Slice Cards emerged as a unicorn this week, after raising $220 million from Tiger Global, Insight Partners and Advent International.
Vikram Chachra, Founding Partner says, “Every friction point for consumers in finance and consumption, is a billion-dollar start-up opportunity. We believe that the Indian economy’s shift to digital presents a $3 trillion market cap opportunity for start-ups over the next decade. At 8i, our mission to seed the founders building the pillars of India’s new digital economy.”
Also read: 8i Ventures starts Fund II raise, with a target corpus of ₹400 crore
8i Fund II is targeting a $50 million Assets Under Management fund to invest in a larger portfolio of winners with higher ownership. The larger fund will give 8i the ability to make bigger bets, with a continued focus on early-stage deals. The fund’s cheque sizes will range between $500,000 to $5 million, depending on the growth stage and maturity of the company. 8i ventures expects to announce the first close of Fund II during Q1 of 2022.
“Three out of six start-ups seeded by 8i Fund I have multiplied their GMV 7X to 28X in the last 18 months. We expect several of the 8i Fund I companies to achieve IPO scale in the next 24-36 months. With 8iFund II, we have additional firepower to lead Seed and Series A deals to support our portfolio companies till they break out and attract late-stage VCs.” says Chachra.
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