Cornerstone Venture backs two B2B startups, targets up to 12-15 investments this year

Wigzo Technologies Pvt. Ltd and IntelligenceNode Consulting Pvt. Ltd raised $1 million (Rs 6.85 crore at current exchange rate) each from Cornerstone Venture Partners.

Cornerstone Venture Partners is a venture capital fund floated by two former Reliance Industries executives. The technology-focussed VC firm, set up by Rajiv Vaishnav and Abhishek Prasad, invested in the two startups through its Cornerstone Venture Partners Fund–I, an official statement said.

Wigzo Technologies is a business intelligence experience cloud for marketers that leverages artificial intelligence (AI) models to enhance customer engagement and improve return on investment (RoI) of marketing spends. It was founded in 2015 by Umair Mohammed and Himanshu Kaushik.

“We are extremely confident that Cornerstone is the right investor in the company to enable growth in global markets. Cornerstone brings tremendous experience and expertise in scaling up companies via their network of GTM Partners,” said Mohammed.

IntelligenceNode Consulting is an intelligence and price optimisation platform that helps retailers track products at the stock keeping unit (SKU) level, and provides real-time intelligence on pricing, stock levels, trends and promotions. Mumbai-based IntelligenceNode Consulting was founded by Sanjeev Sularia in 2012.

“Cornerstone brings with it a huge network of corporates & investors that we can leverage to scale disproportionately. The team has already started opening the right doors for us, and we plan to grow at least 100% by 2020 and raise the next round of capital to support the exponential growth,” said Sularia.

Cornerstone is a sector-agnostic $70 million fund, actively investing in technology enablers of consumer and enterprise businesses. The fund’s investment size ranges from $0.5 million to $3 million with typical participation in ‘Pre-Series A’ to ‘Series B’ stage. Investors in the fund include successful entrepreneurs, professionals, high net worth individuals, family offices and institutions.

“We have known Umair and Sanjeev for a while and seen how committed and patient they have been in building their respective companies as leading innovators in delivering measurable value for their customers. With significant customer traction and revenues achieved, this is the right time for us to come in and help drive the next phase of growth for these companies,” said Nanika Kakkar, investment director at Cornerstone.

The fund expects to announce five additional investments over the next quarter with a target of making 12-15 investments in the current financial year.