Watch: Leo Capital’s Shwetank Verma on exits, breakout sectors for future investments

The increasing inflow of growth stage capital into the Indian startup market will see secondary sales gain ground as an exit strategy for investors, says Shwetank Verma, the Singapore-based founder and partner of seed stage investments focused venture capital firm Leo Capital. 

“I see a lot more interest in later rounds from outside funds; Korean funds, Japanese funds, Chinese funds (which) are starting to look at growth stage (investments) in India. Our view is that there will be significant capital available for secondaries in companies that are doing well,” Verma told TechCircle on the sidelines of the recently concluded TechCircleLIVE Summit in Delhi. 

Verma was also one of the expert panelists at the summit’s Startup Showcase, which saw curated technology startups pitch their ideas to some of the country’s top early stage investors.

At Leo Capital, Verma, who travels frequently to India, helms the Asia operations and enables the firm and its portfolio to collaborate with large corporations in the region. His personal interest, in terms of investments, lies in digital health and fintech. Prior to Leo Capital, Verma spent several years in multiple roles within in the startup and investing ecosystem, including a three-year stint with Singapore-based Richard Chandler Corporation where he invested primarily in Indian ventures.

Since its launch in 2017, Leo Capital has backed 11 companies. The firm, which invests between $300,000 and $1 million primarily at seed stage, counts firms such as cloud based testing platform LambdaTest, influencer driven e-commerce app Bulbulshop, diabetes management app BeatO, ed-tech startup Edureka, among others, in its portfolio. 

While the firm largely continues to be sector agnostic with a strong focus on technology-enabled ideas, gaming, healthtech and insurance technology are breakout areas that the firm will be watching in the next few years.