VCCircle

Erasmic Venture Fund has merged with Accel Partners. They will also raise a new $60M fund later this year.

In a significant development, Bangalore-based early stage investment firm Erasmic Venture Fund has merged with Silicon Valley based Accel Partners, whose portfolio counts companies like Brightcove, Facebook and WalMart.com. The merged entity will form the vehicle for the India entry of the US based Accel, which currently has offices in Silicon Valley, Europe, Israel and China.

Erasmic’s current partners - Subrata Mitra, Prashanth Prakash, Mahendran Balachandran and Gagan Kumar - will join as partners of Accel India Venture Fund. They will also raise a new $60 million fund later this year, Prashant Prakash, partner, told VC Circle in an interview (see here).

The focus of the fund remains the same. Accel India will focus on early-stage venture investing, delivering active, hands-on strategic and operational guidance in partnership with entrepreneurs, the fund said. Erasmic, in which search giant Google has invested as a limited partner, has a portfolio of companies such as Mu Sigma, Inbiopro, HolidayIQ, Kaati Zone, Myntra, Sconce, Virident, among others.

“Accel sees a tremendous need and opportunity for an active, highly-engaged approach to early-stage investing in India,” said Peter Wagner, Partner at Accel Partners. “We are thrilled to be working with Subrata, Prashanth, Mahendran and Gagan, who have demonstrated their ability to add significant value throughout a new venture’s growth, beginning at its very earliest stages.”

Accel’s Global Platform        
Accel globally manages $4 billion worth assets. The fund was founded in 1983 as a US-based firm focused on Silicon Valley but it also started investing selectively internationally, particularly in Israel. Accel London was formed in 2001, with a distinct fund and team of partners dedicated to venture capital in Europe and Israel. IDG-Accel China Growth Fund was launched in 2005, a joint effort between Accel and IDGVC China.

Globally, it has invested in companies like Acopia, Actuate, Agile Software, Arrowpoint, BBN Technologies, BitTorrent, Brightcove, Brightmail, comScore, Facebook, Foundry Networks, Glam Media, Veritas, and Walmart.com, among others.

The Accel India Venture Fund Strategy      
Accel India Venture Fund will pursue the same objective as each of these Accel initiatives, which is to build a position of leadership in its local market while leveraging the advantages of the global network of Accel partners, companies and strategic relationships, a release said.

The fun will work with promising entrepreneurs from the very earliest stages of the new venture creation process. This will include seed-stage investing as well as investments in growing companies that have already begun their operations. So it will provide company-development assistance and strategic support going well beyond its cash investment, a release said.

It will pursue a multi-sector strategy, targeting opportunities in technology, technology-enabled services, internet, mobile, media, life sciences, consumer products and services, and other high-growth sectors of the Indian economy.      

It will typically be the first institutional investor involved in a new venture, and will play an active role in supporting management to shape the venture’s direction. As the portfolio companies develop, Accel India Venture Fund will welcome the involvement of other high-quality investment firms in future financing rounds.