Stellaris Venture Partners closes its second fund at $225 million

Stellaris Venture Partners, an early-stage venture capital firm, has closed its second fund at $225 million, far exceeding its target, with the help of existing limited partners or backers as well as other global institutions.

The second fund's capital base is made up of 80% global institutional capital and the remaining 20 percent was raised by founders based in India and the United States. It held its initial public offering in April and was fully subscribed within 45 days.

With this fund which has International Finance Corporation as a limited partner, Stellaris Venture Partners now has more than $300 million in assets under management.

After raising its $90 million first fund in 2017, Stellaris invested in 19 startups, including online consumer brand Mamaearth, software firm Whatfix, mFine, Slintel, Loadshare, and others.

“In the past four years, Stellaris has built a specialist, depth-oriented investment model that allows us to take early bets in new areas. Whether it is Healthcare AI with mFine or D2C brands with Mamaearth, we have developed conviction ahead of the curve and have been able to back market leaders in emerging categories,” said Rahul Chowdhri, partner, Stellaris Venture Partners.

Stellaris anticipates that the new fund will make 25-30 new investments in seed and Series A rounds of technology companies. It has already begun investing capital from the second fund, with commitments to four startups. The company's most recent investment was in direct-to-consumer lifestyle brand Zouk.

“India’s venture ecosystem has come of age over the last few years with large exits and a massive increase in the volume and quality of new startups. The larger second fund gives us dry powder to tap into this growing opportunity with an ability to back entrepreneurs with more capital and support them for longer. We keep a large reserve for our best-performing portfolio companies and back them through 3-4 funding rounds,” Chowdhri added.

Stellaris was founded in 2016 by Ritesh Banglani, Alok Goyal, and Chowdhri, three former Helion Ventures partners.

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