India’s Stellaris Venture Partners closes second fund at $225 million

India’s Stellaris Venture Partners, an early-stage venture capital firm, has announced the closing of its second fund at US$225 million.

The follow-up to its first fund saw participation from existing limited partners as well as new global firms. The company said that commitments from global institutions made up over 80% of the new fund.

Photo credit: Stellaris Venture Partners

In April, Stellaris Venture Partners completed the first close of the new fund, which was fully subscribed within 45 days. The VC firm now has more than US$300 million in assets under management.

Since setting up its first fund in 2017, the company has invested in as many as 19 startups, including Mamaearth and Whatfix. Other startups in Stellaris’ portfolio include MFine, Slintel, LoadShare, Signzy, and Propelld.

With the fresh capital, the Bengaluru-headquartered firm will look to back 25 to 30 new startups that are in the seed and series A stages. It has already started drawing capital from the second fund to make commitments in four startups so far, including direct-to-consumer lifestyle brand Zouk.

The larger second fund will give Stellaris Venture Partners the dry powder to back entrepreneurs with more capital and support them for longer, Rahul Chowdhri, partner at the VC firm, said in a statement. “We keep a large reserve for our best-performing portfolio companies and back them through three to four funding rounds.”