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Alternative asset management firm Rockstud Capital and micro VC fund Artha Venture Fund have made a partial exit from Everest Fleet, a fleet management service provider to UberIndia.

Uber had invested $20 million in Everest Fleet in June this year, marking its first inorganic investment in India. Everest Fleet had said the funding will enable it to transition from a CNG-dominated fleet to one with both CNG and electric vehicles over the next five years, with a goal of having 10,000 EVs in its fleet by 2026.

Rockstud invested in Everest Fleet in 2019 when the company had only 150 cars in Mumbai. Today, it has over 13,000 cars across seven cities. It has also started deploying EVs, allowing it to return the entire capital to its limited partners (LPs).

“This makes Rockstud Capital one of the very select few VC funds in the country to be able to return the entire capital back to its investors within the fifth year of operations. The fund has generated 18.8X return on its investment through this partial exit,” said Abhishek Agarwal, Founder and Managing Partner of Rockstud Capital.

In 2018, Rockstud Capital launched its first hybrid fund, investing in both listed and unlisted equities across sectors such as mobility, consumer brands, healthcare, fintech, and agritech.

The fund has a portfolio of 10 companies, including BigHaat, Lilac Insights, Knorish, NOTO, and MoneyClub.

The second fund strategy will continue to invest at the pre-Series A stage, following a Yuva Bharat theme across sustainability, financial inclusion, health and safety, consumption, and digitalisation.

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Meanwhile, Artha Venture Fund’s partial exit from Everest has, so far, realised an IRR of 105%, achieving 19X return on investment. Furthermore, several LPs that originally invested in Everest Fleet alongside Artha Venture Fund have also chosen to exit in this round.

This also marks the 31st exit for Artha Group, which has a portfolio of over 100 startups. The group has investments across India, the United States, Israel, Africa, and the United Kingdom and manages assets worth over Rs 1,000 crore. It is now focused on the launch of its next early-stage micro VC fund, Artha Venture Fund II.

“The venture confronted seemingly insurmountable challenges during the pandemic, facing a substantial setback. Yet the resilience and innovative mindset of the founding team shone through,” said Anirudh A Damani, Managing Partner at Artha Venture Fund.

“Their pivot to an asset-financing model unlocked considerable capital and enabled them to transition to an asset-light model in a traditionally capital-intensive sector,” he added.

(Image credit: Everest Fleet Facebook page)