Indian early-stage VC firm Ankur Capital raises $45.4m in its second fund

India-based VC firm Ankur Capital announced it has closed an intermediate round of its Fund II at 3.3 billion rupees (US$45.4 million). It received new funding from the MacArthur Foundation, the Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council, and the National Bank for Agriculture & Rural Development.

The Ankur Capital team/ Photo credit: Ankur Capital

However, the company didn’t specify when the final close of the fund can be expected and what its target amount is.

Established in 2014, Ankur Capital is an early-stage VC firm that’s focused on startups catering to Indian users. Companies under its portfolio include CropIn, an SaaS solution for farmers; alternative protein firm String Bio; Niramai, an AI-powered thermal imaging company for breast cancer diagnosis; and seafood aggregator Captain Fresh.

Ankur Capital aims to enter into seed-round investments with its Fund II, with a ticket size of between US$500,000 and US$5 million for each company. Currently, the firm has invested in four startups and intends to invest in a total of 16 to 18 companies.

“India is in a unique position to build companies for the next billion users that would also be globally relevant. We are witnessing a distinct set of companies that are using India’s large and diverse markets to test products before launching abroad,” said Ritu Verma, co-founder of Ankur Capital.

Fund II will focus on companies working on agritech, healthtech, fintech, edtech, local language technologies, and deep-tech solutions.

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Ankur Capital partners with founders to provide technical assistance, training and support in strategic planning, executive mentoring, financial support, and marketing, talent acquisition, and operations management services.