SenseAI Ventures said Tuesday it has launched its maiden venture capital fund to invest in startups working on artificial intelligence (AI) technologies.
The fund has a target corpus of Rs 200 crore ($25 million), the VC firm said.
SenseAI aims to invest in 18-20 AI-first startups, in the seed to pre-Series A stages. It would look for startups that lay emphasis on intellectual property in technology and products.
“Our approach is beyond capital; as experienced founders and operators we offer support tailored to the needs of each AI-first startup,” said Rahul Agarwalla, co-founder, SenseAI Ventures.
In an interaction with VCCircle, Agarwalla said the firm aims to write first cheques of $500,000 to $1 million. For follow-on investments, it plans to invest around $2 million on average.
Additionally, the firm has brought on board Raja Gopalakrishnan as General Partner for the fund.
“We will continue to build on the foundation of ‘Beyond Capital’ providing more than just funding. We offer a partnership that starts with product and technology, developing AI startups that are both successful and revolutionary,” said Gopalakrishnan.
Established in 2017, SenseAI Ventures is an AI-focused investment firm. Prior to the launch of the fund, the firm invested in 12 startups in the areas of AI software-as-a-service (SaaS), AI business-to-consumer (B2C) and AI tools, through a syndicate fund.
Its portfolio startups include consumer healthcare startup CureSkin, corporate management platform Tripeur and Jovian, a startup that helps data scientists to track and reproduce machine learning experiments.
It has exited four of its portfolio startups and claims to have clocked a 40% internal rate of return (IRR).
