From MakeMyTrip to BigBasket: the investor behind Fundamentum’s new Rs 2,200 crore fund
Sanjeev Aggarwal, who previously backed MakeMyTrip, RedBus and BigBasket, is leading Fundamentum's newly launched third fund alongside anchor investor Nandan Nilekani.
Before co-founding Fundamentum Partnership with Infosys co-founder Nandan Nilekani, Sanjeev Aggarwal had already built a reputation backing some of India’s best-known consumer companies through Helion Venture Partners, including MakeMyTrip, RedBus, BigBasket, Spinny and PharmEasy. Now, Aggarwal is leading Fundamentum’s newly launched third fund, targeting a corpus of Rs 2,200 crore including a Rs 400 crore greenshoe option.
Founded in 2017, Fundamentum was built specifically to focus on Series B investments in Indian technology companies, addressing what its founders saw as a gap in growth-stage financing even as seed and Series A capital became more widely available. Nilekani is anchoring Fund III as a limited partner in what Fundamentum describes as his largest-ever commitment to any venture capital firm.
“India’s Series B moment is now,” said Mayank Kachhwaha, general partner at Fundamentum, noting the firm expects to make eight to 10 investments from the new fund, writing initial cheques of Rs 100 crore to Rs 150 crore for 10-15% ownership stakes. Around 60% of the fund will go toward initial investments, with the rest reserved for follow-on rounds, and a first close expected within three to six months.
Fund III will prioritise consumer technology, fintech, and AI-native or AI-enabled businesses, continuing the strategy that helped Fundamentum’s second fund — which closed above $200 million in 2022 — deliver a gross internal rate of return of 26%, with portfolio companies growing 123% over the past year. The firm’s portfolio already includes Spinny, PharmEasy, Kuku, AppsForBharat, ApnaMart, FlexiLoans, Stable Money, TransBnk, Olyv and ProcMart.
The fund’s launch also marks a leadership transition, with Aggarwal now sharing general partner responsibilities with Prateek Jain, Kachhwaha and Sanjay Chaturvedi, as Fundamentum works to build what Kachhwaha called a long-term investment institution led increasingly by a younger generation of partners.
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