Tiger Global emerges as India's leading investor in startups in '15

Bengaluru: New York-based Tiger Global Management has emerged as the top investor in startups in India during the first four months of 2015. The PE fund, led by Lee Fixel, which manages $10 billion in assets, was placed fourth during same period last year, according to data with funding tracking firm Venture Intelligence. Indian startups feature in 18 of the 26 funding rounds that the investor has participated globally in 2015 so far.

Tiger, founded in 2001, has committed $269 million to 11 deals in January-April period, as against the $10 million for a single deal for the like period in 2014. Tiger, a major investor in Flipkart, has started to make early-stage investments, too, in India.

VC firm Sequoia Capital has made investment worth $208 million in the first four months of 2015 across 14 deals. During the same period last year, VC firm Nexus Venture Partners with $73 million in funding was the largest VC player in the country followed by Kalaari Capital with $45 million in six deals.

"The India focus of Tiger has given confidence to other global private equity and hedge funds to come to India.With the establishment of Bengaluru office, the momentum is going to get accelerated," said Karan Mohla, executive director and head of digital consumer investment at VC firm IDG Ventures.

During this month, the fund has appointed Fixel as the head of its private investments after two of its senior executives left the company.Kalyan Krishnamurthy, MD at the fund, looks at the portfo lio companies in the country.Earlier an interim CFO at Flipkart, he has shifted from Singapore to Bengaluru.

Mohla of IDG said the bullish tech-focused fund has led a $5-million financing round in Chaayos, an offline tea retail chain, with participation from Ola founders Bhavish Aggarwal and Ankit Bhati.

According to Crunchbase, which tracks startups, Tiger has raised $6.7 billion in funding while making 136 rounds of investments in 86 companies globally so far.

Tiger was the top investor in India at $422 million in 2014, despite a lean start. After April, with massive fund infusion into Flipkart, which raised a total of almost $2 billion in 2014, Tiger became the top fund.

It was followed by Russian investor Yuri Milner-led DST Global, which invested $352 million, and Japanese telecom giant Softbank, which in vested $282 million in the Indian startups in 2014.

Disclaimer: This information has been collected through secondary research and IBEF is not responsible for any errors in the same.