India's Lightbox Ventures seeks $200m for Fund III

The firm plans to back up to 10 early-stage start-ups from the fund, founder Sandeep Murthy told Livemint, with a focus on consumer technology companies across segments such as healthcare, specialty e-commerce, and financial services. Lightbox will invest in early-stage rounds and commit follow-on capital to select companies as needed.

Murthy founded Lightbox in 2014 as a spinout from the India joint venture of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB) and Sherpalo Ventures, which had decided to refocus on the US. The GP's first fund, Lightbox I, was raised to acquire the six remaining companies in the KPCB-Sherpalo portfolio, including online used goods retailer GreenDust and photo printing service ZoomIn.

The second fund, launched around the same time, has backed companies such as online jewelry retailer Melorra and used-car trading marketplace Droom. Lightbox also closed a $54 million top-up vehicle last year for follow-on rounds in current investees.

Of the 19 LPs that have contributed to the fund so far, according to a regulatory filing, most are returning from the GP's previous vehicles. While the second vehicle featured a mix of overseas endowments, fund-of-funds, and family offices, Fund III ha a mix of foreign and Indian LPs.

Several GPs are currently on the market raising India-focused VC funds, including SRI Capital and China-based Ganesh Ventures. A number of global firms have also closed India funds this year, such as Sequoia Capital India, Matrix Partners India, and Lightspeed India Partners, along with domestic GPs including Prime Venture Partners and Fireside Ventures.

• Tweet  
• Facebook  
• LinkedIn  
• Google plus  
• Save this article  
• Send to  

• Topics
• South Asia
• Venture
• Fundraising
• GPs
• India
• Lightbox