Deals Digest: Funding value surges on back of big-ticket financial services deal
Private equity (PE) and venture capital (VC) investment saw a substantial jump in terms of value, propelled by a large PE investment in the financial services space. Deal volume, however, dipped slightly this week with the overall number reducing by three deals as compared to the week before. Startups this week raised ......
Searchlight: How a bootstrapped tour and travel firm stood its ground as peers struggled
India’s tour and travel services sector has gone through much disruption over the last decade with several companies folding up or merging with bigger competitors despite raising venture capital funding, but a handful of bootstrapped operators have managed to defy the odds. Mumbai-based Akbar Travels of India Pvt. Ltd is ......
InCred Alternatives' Singla on latest PE fund thesis, sweet spots, exits and more
InCred PE, part of the financial services group InCred that has offerings across lending, wealth and asset management, marked the first close of its maiden private equity fund in March this year at about Rs 330 crore. The fund raised capital from large HNI/UHNI investors. IGPF-I is targeting a final close of ......
Dubai's DFDF plans to deploy half corpus by this year across direct, fund-of-fund bets
Dubai Future District Fund (DFDF), the region’s first evergreen venture capital fund-of-fund, aims to hit the halfway mark of its initial corpus in terms of deployment by the end of the current year, three years since its launch, according to a top company executive. Eyeing startups in the generative AI, climatetech ......
Bottomline: How PlasmaGen Bio plans to break its streak of revenue stagnancy
Bengaluru-based biopharmaceutical company PlasmaGen Biosciences Pvt. Ltd, backed by venture capital firm Eight Roads Ventures, is poised to break out from a stagnant revenue run-rate, as it shifts towards majority in-house manufacturing, top company officials informed VCCircle. While the company’s topline has been stuck in the range of Rs 100-110 crore ......
Bottomline: Oxyzo on its way to top $1 bn in AUM as financials soar
Private equity-backed Oxyzo Financial Services Ltd, the non-banking financial arm of B2B marketplace OfBusiness, is inching closer to the $1 billion AUM (assets under management) mark, even as the company continues to improve its other financial metrics in the financial year through March 2024. Oxyzo, which counts the likes of Alpha ......
MENA Digest: Egyptian startups lead funding activity
Egyptian fintech startups Swypex and MNZL led funding activities in the Middle East and North Africa region,, even as overall deals activity remained bleak this week. The two startups raised seed funding, while the UAE-based Edtech startup SecureMyScholarship raised a bridge round. Startup funding in the MENA region fell sharply in ......
Flutterwave backer LoftyInc courts offshore LP as it aims to quintuple AUM with new Africa VC fund
LoftyInc Capital, a pan-African early-stage venture capital firm, is likely to secure commitment from a European development finance institution for its new investment vehicle. The Lagos-headquartered VC firm is raising the $65-million LoftyInc Alpha Fund that would back tech-enabled enterprises across Africa at seed and Series A stages. It will likely ......
Ola gets a breather after sharp valuation cut ahead of planned IPO
An Ola investor that last year slashed the Indian company’s valuation to a level seen nearly a decade ago has now marked up the value of its holding in the private equity-backed cab aggregator, albeit only marginally, VCCircle has gathered. In what comes as a reprieve for the mobility unicorn that is ......
Bottomline: Gaja-backed Kinara Capital’s assets under management soar in FY24
Small-business lender Kinara Capital, backed by private equity investors like Gaja Capital, Gawa Capital, the Michael and Susan Dell Foundation, among others, grew its assets under management (AUM) for FY24 by 26% year-on-year, VCCircle has gathered from a top executive at the company. “We are on a growth journey and plan ......
