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In 2019, investor Sanjay Mehta, who has 130+ startups in his personal portfolio, set up 100X.VC as a first-cheque fund that would back seed-stage startups and make them discoverable and ‘fundable’ for larger VCs and corporates.
“We don’t take any transaction fees. We tell the world that these are our moats, and you can join the cap table. And we make money along with other investors only when we make an exit,” he tells YourStory.
Infographic: YS Design
Later that year, 100X.VC unveiled its first cohort of 20 startups, having a good mix of tech startups.
In May 2021, the Mumbai-headquartered fund crossed its 50-startup milestone.
With an average cheque size of Rs 25 lakh, 100X.VC has backed 109 founders from Proof-Of-Concept (POC) to the go-to-market stage, generated 460 jobs, and helped 60-70 percent of its portfolio companies raise follow-on funding.
The Interview
Agnikul Cosmos designs, manufactures, tests, and launches orbital-class rockets for nano satellites. The core idea of the startup is to build something quick and simple that can take small satellites and micro satellites to space.
Srinath Ravichandran, Co-founder and CEO, Agnikul Cosmos, talks about the recent funding of $11 million from Mayfield India and plans to launch Agniban into space next year.
Editor’s Pick: How PESU Labs is helping student-led startups
Despite India producing more than one million engineering students and having more than 3,500 colleges, the country only has a handful of on-campus student-registered technology startups. This is what Bengaluru-based PESU Venture Labs aims to change.
Launched in October 2020, the 35-member deep-tech-focused micro fund is a partnership between Bengaluru-based PES University and CoCreate Ventures and operates in the pre-prototype or pre-ideation phase, focusing on industry professionals, student entrepreneurs, and academicians. Read more.
Startup Spotlight
Ensuring quality testing of agricultural produce
IIT Jodhpur alumni Tanmay Sethi, Yogesh Kumar Gupta, and Mohit Dadhich were always keen on exploring the agricultural sector in an effort to improve the lifestyles of rural folks.
This led them to start Nebulaa in Hyderabad in 2016. The startup aims to solve the problem of quality testing of agricultural produce. Its patented product MATT uses AI and Image Processing to do quality analysis in just a minute, but a lot more accurately. Read more.
Nebulaa
News & Updates
- Bengaluru-based Gamut Analytics (Saarthi.ai), a deeptech startup focusing on conversational AI, has recently raised seed investment of an undisclosed amount from Lead Angels Network.
Before you go, stay inspired with…
“India lacks lead investors who can curate deals and give social proof for fundable companies. We wanted to create a discovery platform by funding the company, and having our own skin in the game.”
— Sanjay Mehta, Founder and Partner, 100X.VC
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