360 One Asset rolls out ₹1,000 crore fund for defence and spacetech

The fund has been raised completely from domestic investors and its greenshoe option is now open

360 One Asset, the venture capital and private equity arm, has raised a ₹1,000 crore for fund focused on investments in the defence and space sectors. 

 

The fund has been raised completely from domestic investors. Sameer Nath, chief investment officer and head of private equity and venture capital said that the final close should happen in the next few months.

 

The fund is targeting infusing equity capital across 15 to 20 companies as a dedicated corpus for defence and space tech companies across different stages including from venture or series A to a late stage or pre-IPO. 

 

It has already invested in four companies such as space surveillance and intelligence company Digantara, spacetech firm Sisir Radar, and Coreel Technologies. Firm’s executives added that a fourth investment in the space is to be closed shortly. 

 

 

The fund’s capital allocation is expected to comprise around 20 per cent venture investments or Series A investments, 30 per cent growth-stage investments or between Series B to D stage , and 50 per cent late-stage or pre-IPO deals.

 

The fund is being led by co-found managers Sandeep Maheshwari and Abhishek Nag. 

 

“We see in our portfolio companies that have gone from inception to multiple tens of crores of revenue in a five to six year time frame. These are deeply technical companies,” Nag said. 

 

The fund comes at a time when the defence and spacetech sector has seen the presence of legacy players and a growing number of startups, but relatively limited investment participation.

 

Nath was of the opinion that PE and VC funding has not ventured in the defence and space sector yet. 

 

“Some of these guys have been bootstrapping it for three decades. They probably never even thought that an IPO could happen, but they've built amazing businesses,” said Nath when asked about the listing opportunites in the segment.

 

"Other than the public markets, defence sector may see higger M&A activity as well as consilidation going ahead," he said. 

 

360 One also believes that becuase of the stage of some of the firms, many may eye listing sooner. The firm would explore listing of their portfolio companies in the next two to three years. This comes at a time when defence and spacetech companies are seeing predictable orders, focus on innovation, creation of their own intellectual property, among others. 

 

“All the 4 companies, one of them is Coreel, which we will see a period of anywhere in the next 2-3 years itself or even earlier (where) they should be primed up from a listing perspective itself. We are seeing many more companies, and evaluating a few which can be ready for public markets in the next 18 months itself where we are advanced stage of diligence,” Maheshwari added.