Watch: Samir Kumar on how Inventus will play India’s next startup wave

Samir Kumar has had a ringside view of India’s venture capital market for nearly two decades, first with Acer Technology Ventures and more recently as founding partner at Inventus Capital Partners, one of the country’s earliest specialist technology investors. 

Inventus, which Kumar founded in 2006 with Silicon Valley-based serial entrepreneur Kanwal Rekhi and investor John Dougery, started out with a mandate to invest in technology startups in India and the US from a global fund. About two years ago, Kumar and his Bengaluru-based partners Parag Dhol and Rutvik Doshi decided the time was right for the launch of an India-dedicated fund to ride the next startup wave that they believe will be dominated by startups developing solutions based on frontier technologies such as blockchain, artificial intelligence and IoT (internet of things).

In an interview with TechCircle, on the sidelines of TechCircle Live in Bengaluru last week, Kumar spoke about the mandate for Inventus’ third fund, some of the big wins from the portfolio and why unicorns are a myth.