Fifteen years ago, IvyCap founder Vikram Gupta and his team set up a venture capital firm in Mumbai, but the pitch he had in mind or the funding landscape before him was anything but simple. The startup ecosystem was nascent and primarily supported by angel investors.

Only a handful of private equity/venture capital players were active in that space. Not too many big cheques were written then; exits were rare, and young ventures needed guidance and connections from investors and mentors to script their success stories.

A chemical engineer from IIT-Delhi and an MBA in strategy and finance from Case Western Reserve University, Ohio, Gupta’s foray into venture capital was catalysed by the 2008 financial crisis when he raised INR 400 Cr for a private equity fund under the Piramal Group. His success not only honed his deep understanding of private capital but also underscored the untapped potential of domestic capital. Until then, most Indian VCs relied on overseas capital.

But when Gupta launched IvyCap Ventures in 2011, it was built on the premise that the country’s institutional investors, family offices and high-net-worth individuals should play a leading role in shaping India’s burgeoning startup ecosystem.

As the founder and managing partner of IvyCap, Gupta has ushered in endowment-style investments to fund and foster startup innovations. Simply put, the VC firm has blended the alumni networks of India’s premier institutions (read IITs and IIMs) with venture capital’s traditional model to build sustainable endowment ecosystems.

This helps startup founders access funding and mentoring while the country’s Ivy League gets long-term financial support through their investment incomes. Additionally, it invests heavily in a few high-potential businesses to ensure high-value returns.

Helmed by the industry veteran with 30 years of experience in PE/VC, M&A, strategy and operations, the VC firm has already closed three funds, bringing its total assets under management to more than INR 4,500 Cr.

The VC firm’s portfolio includes 50 startups across healthtech, fintech, consumer brands, electric mobility and the deeptech sector. It is now working on a fourth fund to bolster the country’s startup ecosystem further.

IvyCap launched its first fund in 2014 with a corpus of INR 240 Cr and backed 10 companies, including notable names like Purplle and BlueStone. Fund II came in 2017 with a larger pool of INR 530 Cr and supported 15 startups, such as Clovia, Sokrati, Pharmarack and Aujas, between 2018 and 2021.

It closed Fund III in 2024 at INR 2,100 Cr, with a focus on early-stage investments. The VC aims to invest in 25 startups, with initial funding of INR 30-50 Cr per company. Interestingly, most of the capital for Fund III came from domestic LPs (limited partners) and around 60% was contributed by those who invested in IvyCap’s first two funds. Nearly 40% of this corpus has been invested in a host of ventures such as Dhruva Space, Snitch, Celcius Logistics, GradRight and Eggoz among others underscoring IvyCap’s commitment to diversified funding across sectors.

As part of our Moneyball series, Inc42 had a deep conversation with Gupta, as he discussed IvyCap’s investment thesis, the evolution of India’s startup ecosystem, the investment trends of 2025 and what it would take to build an enduring business in a challenging market.

Here are the edited excerpts.

Inc42: Tell us more about the story behind IvyCap. How is it different from other VC players?

Vikram Gupta: IvyCap Ventures started with a simple idea, but I was deeply passionate about it. When we launched our first fund worth INR 200 Cr, the core concept was to invest in startups by tapping into the unique strength of an alumni-driven ecosystem. So, I created a database of 75K IIT alums, believing that this ecosystem could provide everything we needed – investors, mentors and founders.

We had three core objectives when we reached out to them [the IITians]. These included:

• Establishing a structured investment process
• Identifying and investing........
  

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