Ratan Tata’s VC fund to invest $300 million in start-ups in India, SouthEast Asia and US

RNT Capital, the VC fund set up by Ratan Tata, the Chairman Emeritus of Tata Sons, is reportedly considering deploying $300 million across several start-ups based in India, Southeast Asia and the US.

The VC fund is headquartered jointly in Mumbai and Singapore, and will most probably be investing $10-15 million funds in tech businesses.

It was in February 2016 that Ratan Tata’s investment firm, RNT Associates, had partnered with the University of California (UC Investments) in a bid to jointly fund Indian start-ups over the next 10 years.

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The first two start-ups to have held discussions with RNT Capital are InMobi, the mobile advertising platform and Qikpod, the logistics start-up. Other than these Indian start-ups, the fund would also be investing in two US-based companies.

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“The financing round at InMobi is still to be finalised but the other three investments (including QikPod), are likely to close soon,” a source told TOI, requesting anonymity.

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The core team of this fund includes Singapore-based Mathias Imbach, Tim Recker (MD, Private Equity and Real Assets at University of California Regents) and Mayank Singhal (former associate director at Singapore investment firm Temasek Holdings’ Indian unit).

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