PremiumNEW DELHI: Eximius Ventures, a micro venture capital firm, announced the first close of its maiden fund of $10 million, which it aims to invest in early-stage startups with about $300,000 equity cheque per startup.
“As a fund investing in the pre-seed stage, we would primarily focus on addressing funding and accessibility gaps faced by startups and extend our support beyond capital to offer unconditional network access, expert guidance, help with future fundraising, and more," said Pearl Agarwal, founder & managing director, Eximius.
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Agarwal and her team plan to invest capital in at least 25-30 emerging startups over the next three years, across sectors like edtech, healthtech, fintech, and gaming as well as in high potential industries such as B2B SaaS (software as a service) and online media.
The fund will meet startups that have moved past their minimum viable product and have evidence of initial traction. A strong founding team with relevant experience, initial market validation and a view on the path to profitability will be a part of the evaluation criteria.
“As a woman entrepreneur myself, I want to create ample growth opportunities for women founders in India and want to set a precedent for them to enable them to become equal partners in building a sustainable economy," said Agarwal.
As a micro-VC fund, Eximius wants to nurture young talent in the industry by making smaller seed investments and supporting them with necessary paperwork so that founders can better utilise their time focusing on product development and innovation.
The micro venture capital space in India is still in its nascent stages but with the startup ecosystem expanding, there will be a need for more such agile funds in the near future, added Agarwal.
Prior to launching Eximius, Agarwal has worked with investment companies in the UK and US. She is an active angel investor with 10 companies in her personal portfolio like Trell, BluSmart Mobility, GroMo, and Infeedo, among others.
