Tiger Global’s Scott Shleifer will travel to India next week amid a funding crisis
- ByStartupStory | November 17, 2022
Scott Shleifer, the head of private investments at New York-based Tiger Global, is scheduled to visit India next week. This will be his first trip to the country since at least Covid-19, when he assumed responsibility for managing Tiger Global’s investments in India, according to multiple sources with knowledge of the situation.
Lee Fixel left the firm to launch his own company, Addition, and he assumed control of Tiger Global’s interests in India. Tiger Global, which has supported businesses like Flipkart, Ola, Razorpay, and Upstox throughout the years, is one of the most aggressive investors both internationally and in India. Shleifer arrives in India just as the country is experiencing a decline in venture capital.
According to persons with knowledge of the situation, Shleifer will meet with numerous portfolio companies as well as key internet sector officials from current portfolio companies. The following week is scheduled for meetings. He is at least staying a few days here. Portfolio companies will of course be able to inform him of their performance and ask for guidance on how to handle the turbulent economic climate, one of the people said. Tiger Global did not reply to a request for comment sent via email until the end of the day on Wednesday.
Last month, it was revealed that India had become a key focus for the renowned technology investor at a time when it is raising a $6 billion new fund that is smaller than expected. The planned new fund is much less than the $12.7 billion technology vehicle that was closed the previous year. Even though there have been analogies to the collapse of the dotcom bubble in 2000–2001, this is the first significant slump in the technology sector globally in more than 20 years. At a time when late-stage deals were beginning to slow down in India, Shleifer’s top lieutenant, Alex Cook, recently visited the country to speak with several of the portfolio founders.
According to Venture Intelligence, a company that tracks startup funding statistics, venture funding for Indian startups decreased to $2.7 billion for the September quarter of this year from over $12 billion that companies had raised during the same period the previous year. Regardless of whether Tiger Global has invested in them, he (Shleifer) is also scheduled to see some of the top startup founders, according to the above-mentioned source.
According to a statement, Tiger Global wrote to its limited partners (LPs) last month, “Both B2B and consumer categories are notably underpenetrated relative to other large markets” in India, where the company has spent more than 15 years developing a leading brand and portfolio.
In the letter, Tiger Global claimed that it has begun to accept more early-stage bets worldwide, including in India. According to the statement, “We anticipate that PIP (Tiger Global Private Investment Partners LP) 16 will similarly profit from the differentiated access to compelling early-stage investments, primarily in enterprise themes and in India, and will do so in a lower-valuation market. Tiger Global, one of the biggest tech-focused investment firms in the world, had mentioned that India’s OfBusiness, a business-to-business ecommerce company for the purchase of raw materials, was one such bet where it had a significant holding and which had grown quickly with compelling margins.
Follow Startup Story
Related Posts
