Chandigarh Angels Network ties up with TurningIdeas Venture Partners

TurningIdeas Venture Partners, a Delhi-based angel investor network, has tied up with Chandigarh Angels Network to mentor startups and help them connect with investors.

Ashish Mittal, co-founder and chief mentor at incubation and acceleration platform TurningIdeas Solutions, which runs the network, told TechCircle the tie-up will enable TurningIdeas Venture to refer its potential investees to Chandigarh Angels.

Mittal said both the networks will jointly organise startup conferences, demo days, investor meetups and hackathons. "We see great synergy in the partnering with Chandigarh Angels, helping startups in scaling their businesses," he said.

Chandigarh Angels board member Kunal Nandwani said the partnership is aimed at propelling the startup ecosystem in north India.

Incorporated in last September, Chandigarh Angels aims to invest between Rs 10 lakh and Rs 2 crore in fledgling tech firms across sectors such as education, healthcare and finance. It counts Sameer Jain, CEO of Net Solutions; and Mohit Chitkara, vice president at Chitkara University, among others, as members.

Its past investments include on-demand concierge services Qlivery, e-commerce returns platform JumboBasket and social learning platform Eckovation.

Mittal, who launched TurningIdeas Venture to back technology-oriented startups last month, said the Chandigarh Angels management may also participate in joint due diligence exercise to take startups on board and refer those wishing to get incubated at TurningIdeas.

TurningIdeas Venture has launched a sector-agnostic fund that has a corpus of Rs 33 crore. The fund will invest in 10 startups with the ticket size ranging from $50,000 to $200,000.

The company has already roped in Orissa Cement Ltd joint CEO Amandeep Gupta and Australian investor Dr Andrew Seit as investors on board. Mittal had earlier said TurningIdeas Venture was in an advanced stage of discussion with a few startups in the ed-tech and retail sectors.

TurningIdeas invested in several startups last year. It backed AskMyGift, a mobile app that allows users to create a personalised wish list for gifts. Later in December, it invested in digital seller management startup Focus Digit.

Angel investments have been on the rise in India, primarily driven by successful tech entrepreneurs and top corporate professionals who want to put in their spare cash in startups with high growth potential.

Angel investing kicked off in India in mid-2000s with the formation of networks such as Indian Angel Network. It has now spread across the country with several wealthy individuals investing in startups and with the emergence of newer platforms such as Lead Angels and LetsVenture.

Early-stage funding in the beginning of 2016 marked an uptick, indicating that angel and seed-stage investors kept the initial cheques coming for startups. Based on the deal activity in the first quarter of 2016, VCCEdge's Startup India report estimated in late April that close to 1,000 Indian startups may get funded in 2016.

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