The India head of SoftBank Vision Fund, Sumer Juneja will now have an additional responsibility of Europe Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region to look into investments of the private equity giant in these markets.
Sumer joined Softbank in December 2018 to establish its local presence in India. His elevation follows top-level management changes at the firm, according to a person aware of the development.
Rajeev Misra, a key executive at Softbank Vision Fund is leaving the organisation to launch his own fund, several media outlets had earlier reported.
According to the source, he is expected to shuttle between India and the UK to oversee the investments in the region. Softbank’s big bets in Europe have been on the fintech unicorn Klarna and fantasy soccer platform Sorare. Sumer also serves on multiple boards including Swiggy, Lenskart, Ola, Meesho, MIndTickle and Eruditus.
According to reports, Narendra Rathi and Sarthak Misra, who were promoted as investment directors earlier this year, will assist Sumer.
Softbank declined to comment on this development.
Softbank has witnessed a management churn at the top level with Rajeev Misra stepping down from this primary role to run a new fund. According to reports, he is likely to be joined by other SoftBank executives Yanni Pipilis and Munish Varma.
Softbank has been under pressure having posted a record loss in its recently concluded quarterly results. This is expected to slow down the funding from this Japanese company even as talks of job cuts at the firm begin to surface.
