Venture capital firm Accel, an investor in Flipkart, Swiggy and Freshworks among others has raised a $650 million fund, its seventh focusing on India after a record-breaking year for startup funding and at a time when murmurs of a funding slowdown have begun. The new fund will also invest in Southeast Asian tech startups, a first for Accel, and follows rival VC firms Sequoia and Lightspeed India, which have both expanded to Singapore and Indonesia in recent years. Accel’s new fund topped its $550 million fund raised in late 2019, and it now manages over $2 billion in assets in India. Accel will double down on areas it has invested in so far, including ecommerce, fintech, software and healthcare, in addition to Web3- the catchall term which covers cryptocurrencies and the so-called metaverse.
Accel will primarily invest in Seed and Series A startups from its new fund, compared to peers Sequoia India and Elevation Capital, which are investing in later stage companies as well from their funds. Sequoia India is also raising a $2.8 billion fund, while Elevation is raising $600-650 million. With most VC funds ramping up crypto deals and hiring specialist investors, Accel India is looking to go into individual blockchains and invest in the “picks and shovels” businesses which enable Web3, Daniel said. Accel is an investor in FalconX, a crypto brokerage valued at $3.75 billion whose founder was earlier an Associate with Accel. Accel was in talks to raise $800 million to a billion dollars for its new fund. A relatively smaller fund may also indicate prudence from Accel, which so far has a healthier track record of returning money to investors than some other funds, primarily due to its early bet on online retailer Flipkart, which Walmart acquired for $16 billion.