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Tag: Peak XV

  • Peak XV’s Piyush Gupta is leaving firm to start own secondary-focused VC fund | TechCrunch

    Peak XV’s Piyush Gupta is leaving firm to start own secondary-focused VC fund | TechCrunch

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    Piyush Gupta, one of the operating leaders at Peak XV Partners, is leaving the firm at the end of this month to start his own fund, four people familiar with the matter told TechCrunch.

    Gupta joined Peak XV (called Sequoia India and SEA then) in 2017, leading the influential venture firm’s strategic development team. Before joining Peak XV, he focused on similar things – mergers, acquisitions, and IPOs – at Morgan Stanley and Deutsche Bank for more than a decade.

    Though Gupta didn’t serve as an investing partner at Peak XV, he played an important role at some of its programs including Pitstop, where investors from across the globe liaison with Peak XV’s portfolio startups each year.

    “For early-stage companies, we take a more programmatic approach, such as UpSurge, where we provide a platform for multiple companies to meet with multiple investors over a few days. At later stages, M&A can be a crucible moment in the journey to becoming a large, enduring company,” his bio on Peak XV reads. “Where our job gets incredibly interesting is when we help companies through the journey from pre to post IPO. Going public is an event and a milestone, but the work continues long after that and preparation is key.”

    News of Gupta’s departure was relayed by Peak XV Partners to its limited partners at its annual gathering last month, one person familiar with the matter said, where the fund also unveiled plans to launch a perpetual fund that will be bankrolled by its investment partners and extended team.

    The two are parting ways on cordial terms, two people familiar with the matter said. Gupta plans to launch a secondary-focused fund and Peak XV intends to work closely with him to facilitate transactions at its portfolio firms.

    Peak XV declined to comment and Gupta didn’t respond to a text.

    Secondary transactions are on the rise in India. Peak XV itself has seen some exits — Pine Labs, K12 — through secondary transactions in the past two years. The firm’s holding in Mamaearth, Zomato, K12 Techno Services, Go Colors stood at a 10x-plus multiple as of last November, TechCrunch reported at the time.

    SentinelOne acquired PingSafe, an early-stage startup in India, earlier this year for more than $100 million, TechCrunch reported earlier. PingSafe, which counted Peak XV’s Surge among its backers, had raised less than $4 million before the acquisition deal.

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    Manish Singh

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  • Peak XV takes startups on a Silicon Valley trip in AI push | TechCrunch

    Peak XV takes startups on a Silicon Valley trip in AI push | TechCrunch

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    Peak XV, the venture capital firm that split from Sequoia Capital last year, is taking its portfolio companies from India, Southeast Asia and Australia on an “immersion” trip to Silicon Valley this week to meet several industry titans, the latest in the venture firm’s broadening offerings and networking flex.

    About 60 founders, many backed by Peak XV’s powerfully influential program Surge, will join partners from the firm on the trip to meet industry leaders and visit AI research centers, according to a participant briefed on the matter.

    The week includes strategy sessions with executives from OpenAI and Nvidia as well as Sequoia partner Doug Leone, and talks from seasoned operators like Uniphore chief Umesh Sachdev and DoorDash advisor Gokul Rajaram, according to an email the firm sent to portfolio startups seen by TechCrunch.

    The program, internally dubbed “Immersion Week,” is the latest peek at Peak XV’s broadening roster beyond writing checks as competition intensifies among venture investors seeking access to the most promising AI startups globally.

    India, one of the largest startup ecosystems, currently lacks the depth in deeptech and AI startups. Very few players in India are attempting to build foundational large language models. Sarvam AI, one such startup, announced a $41 million funding late last year led by Peak XV and Lightspeed India and scored a partnership with Microsoft last week.

    Investors say that many existing startups in India are strategizing on what new capabilities to build and in finding customers overseas — and that’s where a trip like ‘Immersion’ can prove beneficial.

    Peak XV, which has $2.5 billion to deploy in the region, has taken an aggressive approach since its split last year, rapidly building out its bench strength and networking capabilities across geographies.

    Peak XV didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment Monday morning. But in the email to portfolio companies over the weekend, Peak XV told founders the trip would “focus on building world-class products” and gaining “a glimpse into the AI world.”

    Peak XV Managing Directors Shailendra Singh, Rajan Anandan, Harshjit Sethi, Ashish Agrawal, and Surge Partner Pieter Kemps are among those hosting the week, according to the person briefed on the matter.

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    Manish Singh

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  • Byju’s investors call for EGM to remove founder following rights issue | TechCrunch

    Byju’s investors call for EGM to remove founder following rights issue | TechCrunch

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    A group of large investors in Byju’s has called for an extraordinary general meeting seeking to change the leadership at Byju’s days after the edtech group launched a rights issue at $25 million pre-money valuation.

    The consortium of investors said it has called for the EGM following many months of continued efforts to address the persistent issues at Byju’s, which at the time of its last fundraise in 2022 was the most valuable edtech globally.

    “The resolutions being put forward for the EGM to consider include a request for the resolution of the outstanding governance, financial mismanagement and compliance issues; the reconstitution of the Board of Directors, so that it is no longer controlled by the founders of T&L; and a change in leadership of the Company,” a consortium of the investors said in a statement Thursday.

    “The issuance of this EGM notice follows many months of continued efforts by shareholders to engage with the Company to address persistent issues relating to corporate governance, mismanagement and compliance. These efforts have been ongoing following the resignationfrom the Board in June 2023 of directors nominated by Prosus and other shareholders.”

    Prosus, General Atlantic, Peak XV, Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, Owl and Sofina are among those requesting the EGM, a source directly familiar with the situation told TechCrunch.

    Full statement:

    As investors with a track-record in supporting the Indian start-up sector over many years, we are strongly committed to serving the long-term interests of the companies in which we invest and their stakeholders.

    With this in mind, pursuant to the rights granted to shareholders under the Companies Act, 2013, a notice has [today] been issued to Think & Learn Private Limited (T&L) shareholders requesting an extraordinary general meeting (EGM) to address persistent issues. The request for an EGM is supported by a consortium of T&L shareholders and follows earlier notices of requisition sent to the T&L Board of Directors in July and December 2023, which were disregarded.

    The resolutions being put forward for the EGM to consider include a request for the resolution of the outstanding governance, financial mismanagement and compliance issues; the reconstitution of the Board of Directors, so that it is no longer controlled by the founders of T&L; and a change in leadership of the Company.

    The issuance of this EGM notice follows many months of continued efforts by shareholders to engage with the Company to address persistent issues relating to corporate governance, mismanagement and compliance. These efforts have been ongoing following the resignationfrom the Board in June 2023 of directors nominated by Prosus and other shareholders.

    While we are grateful for the efforts of the independent advisory council in addressing some of the looming challenges facing T&L, we are deeply concerned about the future stability of the Company under its current leadership and with the current constitution of the Board.

    We believe wholeheartedly in India and in the transformative role that education technology can play in improving teaching and learning. We also continue to believe in the role and contribution of BYJU’s. As shareholders, we will continue to assert our rights, in collaboration with other shareholders and government authorities to safeguard the long-term interests of the Company and its stakeholders.

    More to follow.

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    Manish Singh

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  • SentinelOne acquires Peak XV-backed PingSafe for over $100 million | TechCrunch

    SentinelOne acquires Peak XV-backed PingSafe for over $100 million | TechCrunch

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    SentinelOne’s deal to acquire PingSafe valued the Peak XV-backed young startup at over $100 million, two sources familiar with the matter told TechCrunch, in one of the strongest and fastest deals emerging from India.

    The New York Stock Exchange-listed AI security firm disclosed the cash and stock deal last week, but didn’t reveal the financial terms. SentinelOne, PingSafe and PeakXV didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. The terms of the deal haven’t been previously reported.

    Founded in 2021, PingSafe is a relatively new and small security company with fewer than 100 employees and over 50 customers, mostly in India. The firm remained largely in stealth mode until last year, and was backed by Peak XV’s Surge in the early-stage fund’s sixth cohort. PingSafe had raised a total of about $3.3 million in funding.

    “We think integration of PingSafe’s CNAPP [cloud native application protection platform] will bolster S’s cloud security offering, providing a wide range of agentless CNAPP capabilities – S has expressed its intent to be price competitive in the cloud security market and we wonder if the acquisition will play a role in pricing,” Barclays wrote in a note to clients.

    PingSafe is “among the fastest ‘seed to significant exits’ Indian ecosystem has ever seen,” Rajan Anandan, who leads Surge at Peak XV, tweeted last week.

    “SentinelOne is a pioneer and leader in AI-powered security, and we share a common mission to secure the cloud and make the Internet a safer place,” said Anand Prakash, founder and chief executive of PingSafe and one of the world’s top five white hat hackers, in a prepared statement last week. “The combination of our cutting-edge CNAPP capabilities with SentinelOne’s market-leading AI security platform will supercharge cloud security by providing world-class protection for multi-cloud infrastructure, from development to deployment.”

    The purchase of PingSafe represents a further endorsement of the increasing trend of Indian software companies targeting global expansion. By first developing SaaS solutions in the home market, a new generation of Indian entrepreneurs have subsequently set their sights on worldwide growth.

    New Delhi is inching closer to launch the second phase of its marquee Startup India program with a focus on deep tech startups, Indian daily Economic Times reported Monday. The planned doubling-down on advanced technology companies marks the latest gambit aimed at transforming the subcontinent into a global innovation powerhouse to rival the likes of Silicon Valley.

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    Manish Singh

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