The two major venture capital funds of the SIDBI (Small Industries Development Bank of India) - the National Venture Fund for Software and Information Technology Industry and the SME Growth Fund, which support small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the country, had disbursed Rs 540 crore (around $90 million USD) until March 31, 2014.
SIDBI Venture Capital Ltd (SVCL), a subsidiary of Sidbi set up in July 1999, is an investment management company, presently managing four venture capital funds - the National Venture Fund for Software and Information Technology Industry, the SME Growth Fund, the India Opportunities Fund and the Samridhi Fund. These VC funds provide assistance to knowledge-based micro, small and medium-scale enterprises (MSMEs) in India.
The third fund unit of Sidbi - the India Opportunities Fund - which has a corpus of Rs 600 crore, has made a commitment of Rs 182 crore across 15 companies. This information was given by Kalraj Mishra, the Union minister of micro, small and medium enterprises, in a reply to a question in the Lok Sabha recently.
"Angel investment in India is still in its early stage and is not comparable to international levels particularly in comparison to the USA. However, access to angel funding in India is improving gradually," said Union minister Kalraj Mishra.
Notably, the government has allowed start-ups and SMEs in India to list on the SME exchanges without the mandatory Initial Public Offer (IPO) process, in accordance to which Stock Exchange Bureau of India (SEBI) has permitted listing without an IPO and trading of specified securities of SMEs, including start-ups, on the Institutional Trading Platform (ITP) in SME exchanges.
Number of companies listed on BSE SME platform as on July 31 was 63 and the capital raised by these companies stood at Rs 536.04 crore. The total turnover of these companies was Rs 2195.57 crore and their combined market capital was Rs 7,420.87 crore
SIDBI is a non-independent financial institution aimed to aid the growth and development of micro, small and medium-scale enterprises (MSME) in India.
More recently Small Industries Development Bank of India (Sidbi) also signed a loan agreement worth about Rs 1,800 crore with Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) for promoting energy efficiency in Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs).
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