Now Reading: Founders, investors launch Rs 250 crore fund for impact startups
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Founders, investors launch Rs 250 crore fund for impact startups
A group of investors and entrepreneurs, including Deep Kalra of MakeMyTrip, Vidit Aatrey of Meesho, and Hari Menon of BigBasket, have launched TILT, an impact-focused investment platform with a Rs 250 crore…
A group of investors and entrepreneurs, including Deep Kalra of MakeMyTrip, Vidit Aatrey of Meesho, and Hari Menon of BigBasket, have launched TILT, an impact-focused investment platform with a Rs 250 crore corpus to back early-stage startups serving low-income communities. The fund will invest from seed to series A, with cheque sizes of Rs 2 crore to Rs 16 crore.
Backed by The Nudge Foundation, TILT has a 12-year tenure and targets a funding gap where ventures serving the 'next billion' consumers, earning Rs 1.5 lakh to Rs 5 lakh a year, struggle to find patient capital. The fund will focus on sectors including agriculture, climate resilience, informal work, MSME productivity, and financial inclusion. It plans 20-25 investments and is finalising its first two deals. TILT aims to back 150-plus startups over 15 years and improve 100 million lives, co-founder Atul Satija said.
Indian Opinion Analysis
TILT enters a space where impact startups often fall between grant funding and growth equity. India has roughly 2,000 such ventures serving low-income consumers, but fewer than 50 fund managers focus on the seed-to-series-A gap this fund targets. The 12-year tenure is unusually long for Indian venture capital, where 8-10 year funds are the norm, that structure lets founders build slower-distribution models without pressure to exit quickly. The fund's Rs 250 crore corpus is modest against the Rs 1,500 crore the broader impact sector absorbed in FY24, per industry estimates. The next signal to watch is TILT's first two announced investments: their sectors and cheque sizes will show whether the fund truly backs the early-stage gap it describes.
Source: livemint.com
This brief was synthesised by AI from the source linked above.
