India-based venture capital fund Pi Ventures has raised $25m for its fund from limited partners including the corporate venturing subsidiary of electronics manufacturer Hero Electronix, the Economic Times reported yesterday.
The $25m figure represents a second close for the fund, for which Pi aims to raise more than $30m in total. The other LPs contributing to the second close included financial services firm Canara Bank’s Electronic Development Fund and private investor Sunil Kant Munjal.
Pi is focusing on developers of artificial intelligence, machine learning and internet-of-things technology that can address real-world problems.
The fund has already made four investments, in blood diagnostics startup Sigtuple, breast cancer screening technology developer Niramai, medical data software provider Ten3T and energy management platform Zenatix.
The March 2017 first close of the fund featured investments by the state-backed Small Industries Development Bank of India, In Colour Capital, Accel, International Finance Corporation and individual investors Mohandas Pai, Binny Bansal, Deep Kalra and Sanjeev Bikhchandani.
Manish Singhal, founding partner of Pi Ventures, told ET: “We will be making eight to 10 investments in this year. We are trying to close our fund within the next two quarters.”
Sunil Kant Munjal is the chairman of Hero Enterprise, the diversified company that split off from motorcycle and industrial product maker Hero Group in 2016, the year after the latter formed Hero Electronix.