WestBridge plans to fund 25 Hyd firms

WestBridge Capital Partners, a venture capital fund primarily focussed on outsourced services and information technology companies, is seriously looking at funding 25 companies in Hyderabad.

The company has so far funded 18 companies in India including companies like Philadelphia-based AppLabs Technologies and Santa Clara-based Emagia Corporation, which have their global delivery centres in Hyderabad.

Speaking to Business Standard on the sidelines of TiE-ISB Connect 2005, a forum for connecting budding entrepreneurs with venture capitalists, Sandeep Singhal, managing director of WestBridge Capital Partners, said, "There are around 25 companies in Hyderabad that are on our radar and we are seriously looking at funding them."

The venture capital company, which has its offices in Bangalore and the Silicon Valley, has been investing $50 million-$60 million every year in India since the last two years.

"We look at 5-7 investments every year," Singhal said. The company has also interacted with "2-3 domestic market focussed companies in Hyderabad recently", but Singhal was not keen on divulging further details on those negotiations.

With regard to the kind of entrepreneurs the company has met at the TiE-ISB event, Singhal said that there have been a few interesting concepts that they may look at for funding.

"We may probably network with 10 entrepreneurs having interesting ideas and engage with them over the coming few months," he added.

WestBridge Capital Partners currently manages more than a $100-million fund. Some of the other companies that WestBridge Capital has invested in include ICICI OneSource, Strand Genomics Private Limited and Indecomm Global Services.

Spark VC to set up operations by Oct

Spark VC, a San Francisco-based venture capital company, will be setting up its Indian operations in Hyderabad by October this year. The company has a corpus of $ 40 million which it plans to spend for early stage funding in the next four years.

Speaking to Business Standard, Sadhana Seelam, partner in Spark VC said, "This fund is going to be entirely India-centric and we will be funding $ 2.5 million to $ 3 million per tranche. Besides, we will also be syndicating investment. While our office in India will be in Hyderabad, we will be funding companies across the country."

Spark VC plans to have four-five deals every year and will also have active board member positions in the companies that it funds. The fund is likely to close in October this year.

"In Andhra Pradesh, we will be looking at BT companies," Seelam said. The India-centric fund will focus on IT, BT and infrastructure sectors across the country.