The Venture Intelligence Blog

CAM and Trilegal claim the No.2 & No.3 slots AZB & Partners topped the Venture Intelligence League Table for Legal Advisor to M&A Transactions during the first nine months of 2021. AZB advised 55 qualifying M&A deals worth $25 Billion. AZB was followed by Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas (CAM) ($20.8 Billion across 50 deals) and Trilegal ($16.3 Billion across 18 deals) in the second and third spots respectively. Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas (SAM) ($14.7 Billion across 26 deals) and Khaitan & Co. ($10.8 Billion across 67 deals) completed the top five. Among the largest deals in Q3 2021, AZB, SAM, and Trilegal advised the $4.7 Billion acquisition of digital payments provider Billdesk by PayU . SAM advised Carlyle Group’s $3 Billion acquisition of IT services firm Hexaware Technologies . AZB and CAM advised Sumitomo Mitsui’s $2.6 Billion acquisition of Mumbai-based diversified NBFC Fullerton India . Among foreign firms, Kirkland & Ellis emerged on top advising 2 dea...

Kotak Mahindra Capital and Avendus claim the No.2 & No.3 slots Ernst & Young (EY) topped the Venture Intelligence League Table for Transaction Advisor to M&A Deals   during the first nine months of 2021, advising 23 qualifying deals worth $8.2 Billion. Kotak Mahindra Capital ($7.9 Billion across 8 deals) and Avendus ($5.7 Billion across 7 deals) took the second and third spots respectively. JM Financial ($1.9 Billion across 6 deals) and Deloitte ($1.8 Billion across 3 deals) completed the top five. The  Venture Intelligence League Tables , the first such initiative exclusively tracking transactions involving India-based companies, are based on the value of PE and M&A transactions advised by Financial and Legal Advisory firms. Among the largest deals in Q3 2021, Avendus and Kotak Mahindra Capital advised the  acquisition of digital payments provider Billdesk by PayU . DC Advisory  advised Edtech unicorn Byju’s $600 million acquisition of upskilli...

CAM and SAM claim the No.2 & No.3 slots AZB & Partners (AZB) topped the Venture Intelligence League Table for Legal Advisor to Private Equity Transactions in the first nine months of 2021. AZB & Partners advised PE deals worth $25.6 Billion (across 120 qualifying deals) during the period. Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas (CAM) ($19.9 Billion across 100 deals) and Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas (SAM) ($15.3 Billion across 40 deals) took the second and third spots. Trilegal ($14.2 Billion across 35 deals) and Khaitan & Co. ($10.7 Billion across 78 deals) completed the top five. The  Venture Intelligence League Tables , the first such initiative exclusively tracking transactions involving India-based companies, are based on the value of PE and M&A transactions advised by Financial and Legal Advisory firms. Among the largest deals in the latest quarter, CAM and SAM advised Walmart-owned Flipkart’s $3.6 Billion funding round led by GIC, CPPIB, and SoftBank . SAM advised ...

Ernst & Young and Kotak Mahindra Capital claim the No.2 & No.3 slots Avendus has topped the Venture Intelligence League Table for Transaction Advisor to Private Equity Transactions in the first nine months of 2021. Avendus advised 33 PE deals worth $8.3 Billion during the period. Ernst & Young stood second having advised 20 deals worth $7 Billion. They were followed by Kotak Mahindra Capital with 8 deals worth $3.2 Billion. Credit Suisse ($1.02 Billion across 2 deals) and Ambit Corporate Finance ($1 Billion across 10 deals) completed the top five in the period. Among the largest deals in Q3 2021, Avendus and Kotak Mahindra Capital acted as the advisors to the complete exit by PE-VC investors in Billdesk (via the  digital payments provider's  acquisition by Prosus Ventures-backed PayU) . Avendus also advised edtech firm Eruditus’ $650 million fund raise from Accel USA, SoftBank Corp, and CPPIB, which saw the company become  India’s 61st unicorn . Standard...

REGULATORY REGIME FOR RUNNING A PRIZE COMPETITION IN INDIA   Conduct of prize draws and competitions by sellers (herein referred to as the ‘ Sponsor’ ) to attract customers and sale of their products is a common practice in India. Promotional schemes offering gifts, prizes, or other items free of charge on its closure is intended to entice customers to buy multiple packs of products sold by the Sponsor. The organizers’ of such prize draws and competitions should however assess if they are subject to certain central and separate state legislations concerning prize competitions.   This update is limited to the regulatory regime concerning prize competitions and doesn’t cover gambling, gaming or lotteries legislations or regulations applicable in India.   Central Legislation:   The Central Government has enacted the Prize Competition Act, 1955 (“ PC Act ”) to  inter alia  control and regulate the prize competitions. The term ‘prize competitions’ has been defin...

VC SERIES | PART IV – THE INVESTMENT PROCESS! Once the founders are done negotiating and signing the  term sheet , the transaction moves to the process of subscription. The subscription process essentially starts with the due diligence and proceeds with signing the detailed transaction documents. Broadly speaking, closing of an investment round is subject to satisfactory completion of a ‘due diligence’ exercise by the VC fund and signing of the transaction documents such as share subscription, shareholders’ and employment agreements. Immediately upon execution of the term sheet, a VC fund commences its due diligence process – legal, tax, financial, technical, as they deem fit. Along with conducting the due diligence, the negotiations for the transaction documents are also commenced. Due diligence Due diligence is essentially a review conducted on the startup’s business and operations to find out any material issues that the investors need to be aware of before making their investme...

Press Release Private Equity - Venture Capital (PE-VC) firms invested a record $49 Billion (across 840 deals) in Indian companies during the first 9 months of 2021,  shows data from  Venture Intelligence , a research service focused on private company financials, transactions and their valuations. These figures, which have already surpassed the full year investment total of $39.5 Billion (across 892 deals) in the entire of 2020, represent a 52% increase over the   $32.2 Billion (across 651 deals) in  the first nine months  of 2020. (Note: These figures include Venture Capital type investments, but exclude PE investments in Real Estate). The $20 Billion investments in  Unicorns  (VC-funded startups valued at $1 Billion or more) account for close to 41% of the value pie in 2021 thus far. The July-September 2021 quarter (Q3'21) saw over $10 Billion (across 28 deals) being invested in such companies. India has minted a total of 29 Unicorns  ...

VC SERIES: PART III – THE TERM SHEET DECODED! In the previous  article  of this series we discussed the strategy to be adopted by founders while negotiating a term sheet with a VC fund. Now, on to certain important legal terminology. It is necessary for founders to be aware of and understand the implications of the legal jargons which could impact their rights in the business. Liquidation preference First and foremost – the liquidation preference. Liquidation preference is the investors’ right to get their investment amount back before the holders of common shares (equity shares) get any returns. The common shares are usually owned by the startup’s founders and employees. The preference applies when the startup undergoes a sale of its business by way of any corporate action or it distributes profits to its shareholders. With respect to liquidation preference, the most important element for founders to be mindful of is the type of liquidation preference being demanded by the VC...