The Venture Intelligence Blog

Angel investor and former Snapdeal executive Anand Chandrasekaran has confirmed quitting Facebook after a two-year stint at the social networking giant’s Menlo Park headquarters. Anand was serving  as Director of Platforms and Product Partnerships. Prior to Facebook, the Stanford University and PSG College of Technology graduate had served as Chief Product Officer at Snapdeal and its unit Freecharge (May 2015 to Jul 2016) and before that, Airtel (2013-2015).  Anand’s exit from Facebook quickly follows Neeraj Arora’s quitting as Chief Business Officer of the Facebook owned WhatsApp, after a 7 year stint. Neeraj, who described himself as "all things business at WhatsApp" on his LinkedIn profile , had earlier worked in Corporate Development roles at Google and Times Internet. The Indian School of Business and IIT-Delhi graduate has also served on the board of Paytm. Venture Intelligence is India's longest serving provider of data and analysis on Private Compan

Sajith Pai, Director, Blume Ventures is sceptical. In an LinkedIn post titled "The Rise of Hyperlocal Vernacular Video News Apps in India" - which was abridged in The Mint -  he highlights how, in the last year, VCs have backed a clutch of hyperlocal Regional Language news apps - including LocalPlay, Lokal, Awaaz, Circle etc. - that primarily use short video snippets. Extracts: India2 doesn’t consume much text, instead it gorges on video, thanks to cheap data. Increasingly short-form video content has emerged as the dominant media unit of India today, spurring the emergence of homegrown social networks / platforms such as ShareChat, Clip, Mooshak etc., as well as the rise of news aggregators such as DailyHunt, NewsPoint, NewsDog etc. And now they are driving the rise of hyperlocal news apps built around video. ...A startup I spoke to estimated their annual cost for sourcing, authenticating, producing and distributing content (20–25 videos / day) to be close to Rs

A Business Standard article quote Venture Intelligence data on Private Equity investments in NBFCs: Private Equity (PE) investments in India’s non-banking financial companies (NBFCs) in the January-November period of this year has reached $2.041 billion - 88 per cent more than full 12 months of 2017 and the highest in four years. The increase in overall PE investment value has been despite the number of deals this year being lower than last year, and the sector facing a liquidity crisis. According to data from Venture Intelligence, the NBFC sector has received a total of $2.04 billion in 25 PE investment deals so far this calendar year, compared with $1.09 billion in 32 deals during full 2017. Among the biggest such deals was the $1,06-million KKR-GIC investment in HDFC Ltd in January 2018. Besides, two major PE deals were announced last week — TPG Growth-led $42-million equity investment in Ess Kay Fincorp, and the Rs 2-billion investment by Norwest Venture Partners X, CDC Gro

Arun Natarajan, Venture Intelligence shares on funding trends with Chandra Srikanth on ET Now's Startup Central - Funding Meter. Venture Intelligence is India's longest serving provider of data and analysis on Private Company Financials, Transactions (private equity, venture capital and M&A) & their Valuations in India.