IIT Kanpur is organising Megabucks, an annual entrepreneurship competition, from February 11-12, 2006. The event is a platform for spotting ventures/business plans of students and professionals.
It aims at serving as the right platform for budding entrepreneurs to act on their ideas and talents to develop them into reality and nurture them to form exceptional enterprises, [...]

Actis buys stake in Sandhar for $23 million
Actis, the UK-based private equity investor, has invested $23 million (approximately Rs 104 crore) in Sandhar group, including its flagship company Sandhar Locking Devices. The Gurgaon-based Sandhar group is into component manufacturer of to both two- and four-wheeler manufacturers.
India Infoline to raise Rs1 billion via private placement
India Infoline [...]

Business Standard reports that Ramakrishna Forgings, a Kolkata-based steel forgings company, has “shortlisted some private equity funds of both domestic and foreign origin” for a private placement.
The company is planning to invest Rs 50 crore to double its forging capacity at its Jamshedpur plant, and the managing director of the company, Naresh Jalan, said it [...]

According to a report in Business Standard, Taib Bank has emerged as the largest lead foreign investor in the $155 million Leverage India Fund anchored by IL&FS Investment Managers Limited (IIML). Taib Bank is learnt to have contributed close to $60-70 million for this fund which is IIML’s seventh fund and the largest one so [...]

I had written about how broking firms have become the new flavour of private equity firms. Now it seems Texas Pacific Group is close to picking up stake in Mumbai based broking giant Sharekhan (owned by SSKI Securities Ltd). Says a Times of India report:
Vivek Paul, the top shot executive who quit software-major Wipro six-months [...]

I met Mukul Gulati, a managing partner at Peacock Partners, at ContentSutra mixer in Delhi last week. The New York-based venture firm is setting up its India venture fund with some $75 million in capital to invest.
Its headquarters will be in Bangalore and Gulati and his other partner Kartik C. Parija are currently scouting for [...]

UTI Venture Funds has invested Rs 35 crore in Suryalakshmi Cotton Mills for a 10.7 per cent stake. Suryalakshmi Cotton Mills said its Board of Directors has approved the offer and issue of 14,28,300 equity shares on a preferential basis to UTI Venture Funds at a price of Rs 245 per share. The company plans [...]

Airports are happening in Kerala, which has a very strong NRI community flying in and out. There is a pretty high traffic to Gulf (apparently Air India makes all its money from Kerala-Gulf sectors), and now, lately, to other countries too - like the US, UK and so on. This explains why there are three [...]

The Financial Express has an interview with Arvind Sodhani, President of Intel Capital in India. After Intel announced a $250-million India venture fund recently, it has made three investments - two were follow-on investments while the third, in Mobiapps, was an investment in the fast growing communications technology space. Sodhani talks about what sectors he [...]

A story on private equity money chasing hotel deals in India in Express Hospitality.
WestBridge Capital Partners has made a significant equity investment in the Royal Orchid Hotels and acquired 10 per cent stake in the group for Rs 250 million, ICICI Venture Funds also acquired 26 per cent stake in the equity of the Hyderabad-based [...]

Following in the footsteps of Arshad Zakaria (ex-Merrill Lynch and now New Vernon) is another ex-global honcho of Morgan Stanley. Vikram Pandit, who quit the investment banking firm in March 2005, is now back in India scouting for investment opportunities. Pandit is floating a yet-to-be named private equity firm.
His proposed fund, or ‘pool of capital’ [...]

Online businesses should be making a comeback in India. Currently the Internet subscriber base stays at 38.5 million (according to IAMAI), although this number is contested by one of the brightest and young researchers in India like Laveesh Bhandari (he runs a research and analytics firm called indicus) in a private chat with me at [...]

India’s software business body, National Association of Software and Services Company (Nasscom), has asked the government to set up a venture capital fund to promote innovation in software product space.
“This kind of a fund would ensure a sort of back-up for those angel investors and allow them to take a greater risk while funding product [...]

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VC Funding Could Bring India Out of the Backroom
Q&A with Sumant Mandal, managing director at Clearstone Venture Partners, a venture capital firm with more than $650 committed capital (IT Business Edge)
“There’s once-in-a-lifetime opportunity here”
Interview with Akhil Gupta, senior managing director and chairman of Blackstone India. Eight months after he took up his new assignment, Gupta, [...]