Stride Ventures Announces 1st Close of Third Venture Debt Fund at $100M

• Stride Ventures announces the first close of its third venture debt fund at $100 million
• The first close of this fund has been achieved within 4 months of receiving the license for the third fund.
• Stride will target a final close of over $200 million for the third fund.

Stride Ventures, one of the leading and most active venture debt firms in India, has announced the successful first close of its third venture debt fund at $100M. The pioneering firm continues to be at the forefront of the venture debt market in India and is targeting a final close of over $200 million for the third fund.

The Indian Venture Debt market is expected to reach an annual deployment of $ 3-4 billion by 2025 and Stride is strategically harnessing this growth potential to build a legacy brand. It has demonstrated industry-leading returns with best-in-class asset quality and a well-diversified portfolio of 100+ market leaders like SUGAR Cosmetics, The Good Glamm Group, Mensa Brands, Exotel, Yubi, MoneyView, VideoVerse, Miko, Perfios, HealthifyMe, Ace Turtle and Waycool to name a few. During the past two years, the firm has received multiple prestigious awards for its role in introducing and pioneering alternative funding in India.

“We are ecstatic to announce the first close of our third fund," said Ishpreet Gandhi, Founder and Managing Partner of Stride Ventures. "Stride takes immense pride in being the largest contributor of credit to new age businesses that has sanctioned over ~ INR 5000 Crore in the Indian startup ecosystem. Stride Ventures' success in delivering value to its investors is a testament to our rigorous processes and strong internal governance structures.”

The firm accomplished another remarkable feat by successfully distributing over 100% of its commitments, which included coupon payouts and principal redemptions, to the early investors of its Fund 1.

“Stride’s founder-centric approach coupled with the overwhelming support from our investors, enables us to keep raising the bar for the venture debt market in India,” said Apoorva Sharma, Managing Partner at Stride Ventures. "We see a growing demand for venture debt as startups look to optimise their capital structure and preserve equity for future rounds. With the launch of our third fund, we're well-positioned to meet the unique debt requirements and global ambitions of Indian startups."

Stride Ventures’ third fund has received solid backing from a varied group of institutional investors, including banks, insurance companies, and family offices. This fund will persist in making prudent investments in fast-growing startups that exhibit robust business models, strong unit economics, and skilled management teams. We also want to take this opportunity to express gratitude to our investors, founders, and the entire VC ecosystem for their continued trust and support.

About Stride Ventures

Stride Ventures is a venture debt firm that provides customized debt solutions to startups in India. The firm is focused on supporting high-growth startups in sectors such as Consumer internet, FinTech, SaaS, and B2B platforms. Stride Ventures has already invested in more than 100 startups across its two funds and aims to continue to support the best startups in India with its third fund.

For more information, please visit - https://strideventures.in/

Federal Bank joins Unicorn India Ventures as Anchor LP for ₹600 crore Debt fund

Mumbai-based Vneture Capital fund, Unicorn India Ventures, has signed Federal Bank as anchor LP for its Rs 600 crore Venture Debt fund. Federal Bank is a major Indian commercial bank in the private sector headquartered at Aluva, Kerala, having more than a thousand branches and ATMs in India.

The Bank has agreed to invest in Unicorn India’s Venture Debt fund, which is expected to announce its first close this quarter. Unicorn India Ventures launched their maiden Venture debt fund last November to meet the increasing demand for debt capital from entrepreneurial ecosystem.

Mr M Damodaran, Chairman, Unicorn India Debt Fund, says,“In Federal Bank, we have an ideal Anchor LP for our venture debt fund. We seek to establish a complete 360” relationship with our Anchor for mutual benefit."

The venture debt fund would look to invest in up to 12 startups a year with the investments likely to begin in the 3rd quarter of the financial year. The venture debt fund market over the last 2 – 3 years has seen a fast growth trajectory with large startups like Myntra, Faasos, Flipkart, Curefit, Furlenco raising sizeable debt funding rounds. Encouraged by this high demand, there is considerable interest from financial institutions, banks and family offices to invest in this asset class.

Mr Ashutosh Khajuria, ED & CFO, Federal Bank, says, “Early stage ecosystem is where the action is and over last year, there is an increasing demand from entrepreneurs to raise debt for meeting their growth milestones, which traditional lending system is unable to meet. That is why we believe, we can associate with these entrepreneurs and meet their debt needs by partnering with a like minded team which we found at Unicorn India and decided to come on-board as an anchor for their debt fund."

The debt financing market for Indian startups stands at roughly Rs 1,000 crore annually, which is currently not being serviced by the traditional banking system. But the emergence of Venture Debt funds in India, will address the gap between equity and debt financing needs of entrepreneurs and help them keep a large chunk of their equity while providing additional runway to raise bigger follow-on rounds of equity at much higher valuations.

Unicorn India Ventures is a Mumbai-based fund house with both equity and debt funds under its belt. Started in 2015 by Anil Joshi and Bhaskar Majumdar, the Fund House has recently launched a UK India cross border fund for funding UK startups looking to enter India.

Unicorn India had recently invested in Kochi, Kerala-based startup Inntot, which is a software defined radio startup marking Unicorn India’s sixth investment in Kerala-based startups as earlier in February this year, UNicorn India had invested in five startups — Genrobotics, Perfectfit and SectorQube, Bank Open and Clootrack.