Speciale Invest closes Rs 600 crore Fund III to invest in Indian deeptech startups

Speciale Invest, a Chennai-based venture capital firm known for backing deeptech startups, today announced the close of its third fund at Rs 600 crore, exceeding its initial target of Rs 500 crore. 

Advertisment

The fund will focus on 18 to 20 pre-seed and seed-stage startups over the next four years. About half the corpus has been earmarked for follow-on investments. 

The firm aims to raise its average stake in portfolio companies to roughly 15%, compared with 5% in its maiden fund and 10% in Fund II.

The fund is anchored by returning limited partners, including domestic family offices, high-net-worth individuals and strategic investors, with smaller participation from institutions and corporate venture capital arms.

Speciale said Fund III’s thesis rests on five pillars: supporting startups aligned with India’s strategic autonomy in sectors such as space, dual-use defence, energy, semiconductors and climate resilience; ensuring early compliance with global certification standards; incubating capital-efficient ventures with strong founder-market fit; and developing intellectual property in India for global markets.

The sectoral spread will include AI infrastructure, spacetech, quantum systems, advanced manufacturing, computational biology, climatetech, healthtech and defence technology.

“We believe the next generation of global champions will emerge from India’s labs, R&D centers, and workshops. In a geopolitically complex and technologically interdependent world, building for India’s resilience and sovereign capabilities is not just a national imperative—it is also a generational venture opportunity,” said Vishesh Rajaram, Managing Partner, Speciale Invest.

“Deep-tech represents one of the most exciting frontiers for venture capital in India. The combination of world-class technical talent, increasing policy support, and global market access has created an unprecedented window to back companies solving some of humanity’s most complex challenges from India,” said Arjun Rao, Partner, Speciale Invest.

Founded in 2017 by Vishesh Rajaram and Arjun Rao, Speciale has backed early-stage companies such as Agnikul Cosmos, GalaxEye, The ePlane Company, QNu Labs and Fermbox.

The firm has recorded nine exits via mergers and acquisitions and has expanded its investment pool steadily, from Rs 60 crore in its first fund to about Rs 300 crore in its second. In 2023, it launched a Rs 185 crore growth fund to participate in later rounds of its portfolio companies.

India’s deeptech ecosystem, while growing, faces persistent challenges: a shortage of patient capital, regulatory hurdles, difficulties in commercialising research and the migration of top talent overseas. In April 2025, Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal described the sector’s output as “disturbing,” urging founders to focus on global competitiveness rather than incremental business models.