Malaysia-based phone operator Axiata has probably been the most active corporate venture capitalist across south-east Asia region, according to insiders, with a two-pronged approach: a direct investment model using an in-house team and off the balance sheet and a corporate venture fund managed by a third-party, Intres, in collaboration a state-backed agency.
Bharadwaj Ogirala in the corporate development team at Axiata Digital Services is in the former ‘prong’ and a Global Corporate Venturing Rising Star 2017 with an eye on a top job as a CVC.
Srinivas Gattamneni, head of corporate development at Axiata Digital and a member of the GCV Powerlist 100 in 2016, said: “Bharadwaj’s dealmaking skills combine a strong blend of strategic as well as financial skillset, which is essential to unlock value for the corporate investor as well as the investee. He has been instrumental in growing Axiata portfolio in the digital arena. Axiata Digital has done over 20 investments in three years and deployed over $200m in capital.”
Ogirala has been with Axiata for about two years and led four deals and played a support role in five others. He said: “I have evaluated deals in wide array of industries including digital advertising, e-commerce, mobile financial services, entertainment, digital enablement sectors. My notable closed deals are the acquisition of Komli Asia and series C investment into Storeking.”
Storeking raised $16m from Axiata in June, which was the first time Axiata Digital has invested in an India-based startup, although it owns a 19% stake in telecoms operator Idea Cellular in the country.
Adknowledge Asia Pacific acquired Komli’s operations in Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia and Hong Kong for a reported $11.25m. Adknowledge is an 80%-owned subsidiary of Axiata Digital Advertising, a wholly owned unit of Axiata Digital Services, which in turn is a wholly owned subsidiary of Axiata Group.
Ogirala, who is also a group eonsul at an expatriate networking community, added: “The acquisition of Komli Asia by Adknowledge Asia was a milestone deal at our unit – as it was the first 100% acquisition at Axiata Digital. The main strategic reason behind acquiring Komli Asia was to tap into the strong team they had built in this region and it was pleasing to see Komli team members take up senior roles – CEO, chief marketing officer, vice-president finance, in the merged entity.”
Prior to Axiata Digital Services, Ogirala had a similar corporate development role at land bank Goodhope Asia for three years, where he negotiated and closed two CVC deals in the animal feed sector, he said.
Ogirala said: “CVC requires the right mix of strategic thinking, valuation and deal negotiation skills. I had picked these skills over time from my consulting experience [at PwC], business education [at Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay then an MBA program at Indian School of Business, Hyderabad] and chartered financial analyst certification. The opportunity to apply these skills was what attracted me to CVC. Further, it is quite fulfilling to see your investment thesis come to fruition by you taking control of synergy extraction and portfolio management.
“The biggest challenge, however, is to run CVC deals at a breakneck speed while dealing with corporate red tape. Corporate M&A teams and support functions are designed to run deals of large deal sizes with the deal running over many months. But as CVC competes with VC money it needs to be agile and close the deal in a very short time. As startups typically experience high growth and high burn rate, it becomes imperative to close the deal in short time without affecting the valuation metrics.
“My professional ambition is to continue making solid investments creating value. In my current role, this would mean ensuring that the current investments are validated by external fundraising or by an exit – IPO or sale. In the near future, I wish to head the CVC function and take a board role in the investee companies.”
Once in a top job and even beforehand, he said the industry “should encourage more cross investments by CVCs”, adding: “Often the synergy links are much stronger when there is a collaboration with corporates from complementary industries.”
For the noted photographer, that would be a picture worth capturing.