Anti-portfolio | I look for perseverance of the entrepreneur to execute plan against all odds possible: Sachin Tagra

I have been investing in startups over the last four years and have invested in 10 companies in an individual capacity. I invest directly and through angel investment platforms like Venture Catalysts, LetsVenture, etc. I like early-stage tech businesses across sectors with a bias toward B2B opportunities.

As angel investors, we look for many variables while making an investment decision, but, for me, the most important thing is the problem a startup is solving and how large the market for that economic solution is. Secondly, I look for perseverance of the entrepreneur to execute the plan against all odds possible. Thirdly, I take into account the founder’s approach to cash burn while scaling up the business.

When I met Varun (Sheth) a few years ago for investing in Ketto—a crowdfunding platform—I was not convinced that consumers will donate towards social causes through a digital-only crowdfunding platform when we have so many NGOs in our country trying to do the same.

I also had apprehension around the ability of the founding team to execute this change in behaviour among consumers. I recently happened to meet Varun at a professional gathering and was pleasantly surprised to know that they have scaled up to 2,000 fund-raising campaigns a month with a monthly fund-raise of approximately ₹10 crore by 50,000 individual donors. Another interesting aspect was to know repeat donation behaviour among individual consumers, going beyond families and affiliates.

Ketto is also one of the few angel-funded startups that have grown to be operationally profitable with limited capital and created significant value for the early investors. As more than 85% of the fund-raise is for medical causes and education support, I also missed an opportunity to earn good Karma points in life by not investing in Ketto.

The writer is Angel investor and head-Capital18, Network18 Group