Lightspeed establishes Southeast Asia VC team

The US-headquartered VC secured the physical office in February but has yet to bring together an on-the-ground team due to travel complications related to COVID-19. Bhushan, currently a partner in Lightspeed’s India practice, plans to relocate to Singapore next month.

Three investment professionals have joined, including Bejul Somaia, a partner at Lightspeed India, who will work across both markets. They will be supported by new recruits Pinn Lawjindakul and Marsha Sugana, who will fill roles as vice president and senior investment associate, respectively.

Lawjindakul has previously worked for Grab, Bain & Company, and Tiger Global Management. Sugana, an Indonesian native who will focus on building out exposure to that market, has enjoyed stints with L Catterton, Goldman Sachs, and BlackRock.

The challenges of setting up an expansion office during COVID-19 included recruiting Sugana without having met her in person. “We’re very diligent when we add people to a team, and we have small teams. So that was new behavior for us,” Bhushan told AVCJ. “But as we look at some of our entrepreneurs, this has become business as usual for them now in terms of having to add team members and expand businesses, all remotely.”

Bhushan estimates that he spends about 50% of his time in the office in India, but that this figure falls to 20% when working in Southeast Asia due to the need to travel between markets. “The concept of the office is going to change,” he said. “We’ll have a physical space, but how we use that will change.”

While Lightspeed has dedicated funds for India and China, the Southeast Asia team will draw on a $4 billion global pool of capital established earlier this year. It comprises of three funds, Lightspeed Venture Partners VIII ($890 million), Lightspeed Venture Partners Select ($1.8 billion), and Lightspeed Opportunity Fund ($1.5 billion). These vehicles target early, growth, and late-stage companies, respectively.

Lightspeed has made fewer than 10 investments in Southeast Asia to date, with standouts including Grab and mapping software provider Nextbillion. Singapore, Indonesia, and Vietnam will be the core target markets, with other geographies considered on an opportunistic basis. Areas of interest include education technology, enterprise digitization, e-commerce, and logistics. Bhushan noted that strategy will continue to adapt to the realities of COVID-19.

“We’ve been in the market somewhat for the last few years, so we’ve built a set of relationships and networks where we derive comfort as we look at companies,” he said. “It’s not 100% business as usual, but for a lot of the sectors where we are seeing lift, and the ones we’re tracking, it’s more digital products, and we’re beyond the mental barrier of having to meet a founder in person necessarily before investing.”

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