Industry veterans Atul Hegde, Sudhir Menon launch $50 million fund

Bengaluru: At a time when investment for start-ups is becoming scarce, industrialist Sudhir Menon and digital marketer Atul Hegde have launched a $50-million early stage start-up fund, Rainmaker Ventures.

Sudhir Menon is the chairman and managing director at Dorf Ketal Chemicals India Pvt. Ltd, a chemical manufacturer, while Atul Hegde, a veteran in the digital media industry, is the chief executive at Ignitee Digital Services Pvt. Ltd, a Mumbai-based advertising and marketing agency.

“We strongly feel that early-stage start-ups need full time mentoring as much as they need capital. I have seen most start-up businesses fail to move on to the next stage due to a lack of real-life business experience,” Hegde said in a statement.

“Simply infusing capital is not the only requirement. That’s where Rainmaker Ventures come in. We want to create a value-establishment—one that creates and nurtures real businesses in today’s virtual world,” he added.

The fund, which will have a presence in India, the US, Brazil and Singapore, will look to invest the initial corpus essentially in technology start-ups.

Rainmaker Ventures will look at mentoring 10-12 early-stage start-ups in its first year of operations.

“Today, capital seems to be chasing anything that is in the garb of a tech start-up. This scenario will get a reality check very soon,” said Menon. “In the end, it’s real business that counts, both to the founders and the investors. Rainmaker Ventures will focus on helping budding entrepreneurs to build a strong business on the ground.”