Wipro picks minority stake in US fraud prevention firm Emailage Corp

India’s third largest IT services firm Wipro has made an undisclosed investment to pick up minority stake in Emailage Corp, a US risk assessment and fraud prevention company.

This investment is in line with Wipro’s strategy to participate in the external innovation ecosystem, for which the company has set up Wipro Ventures, Wipro said in a notice to the Bombay Stock Exchange.

Emailage, based in  Arizona in the US, has presence in Brazil and the United Kingdom, working with Fortune 500 financial institutions, merchants, businesses and organizations globally.

Wipro Ventures is a $ 100 million fund set up to invest in early-to-mid stage startups both in India and globally. The fund focuses on investment in technology areas such as big data and analytics, artificial intelligence, digital, internet of things and security.

Rishad Premji, a director of Wipro and elder son of Azim Premji, Wipro's billionaire chairman, runs the $100 million fund that invests in technology startups globally. Venu Pemmaraju, former senior investment manager at Intel Capital and Biplab Adhya also manage the $100 million fund.

So far, Wipro ventures has invested in three companies – Vicarious, Talena and Drivestream, firms based in the United States.