With $3M fresh capital from IFC, pi Ventures bets big on AI companies

Indian venture fund pi Ventures has raised $3 million from International Finance Corporation (IFC), a part of the World Bank Group. The amount will be used for investing in companies leveraging technologies such as applied artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning and IoT across a range of sectors. IFC is making investments through its ‘Startup Catalyst programme’ which aims to build local ecosystems to drive innovation and entrepreneurship. Through the programme, IFC aims to invest in sustainable seed-stage funding mechanisms, including accelerators and seed funds, for supporting early-stage entrepreneurship globally. IFC has both a direct investment practice and is also a Limited Partner (LP) to local PE and VC funds. IFC’s focus areas in venture capital include consumer internet, edutech, healthtech, cleantech and emerging technology solutions based on data analytics and AI. Its venture capital investments in India include online grocery major Big Basket, edutech startup Byju, Portea- a company providing affordable home-care and Blackbuck, a player in e-logistics.

“This investment is aligned with IFC’s objective to act as a catalyst to spur entrepreneurial activity and support technology start-ups that drive innovation in India and globally, and solve complex problems across industries”, says Ruchira Shukla, Regional Lead, Venture Capital, South Asia, IFC.

pi Ventures had recently announced the first close at $13 million. It has made four investments so far in the healthcare & energy-efficiency space, namely Sigtuple, Zenatix, Ten3T and NIRAMAI.

“Getting IFC to back us in our journey is very meaningful to us. Not only do they bring a wealth of knowledge but also a world-wide network which can be very useful for our investee companies. We appreciate IFC backing disruptive product companies in the Applied AI space via pi Ventures,” said Manish Singhal, Founding Partner, pi Ventures.

In addition to strengthening local capital markets in India, IFC aims at boosting financing in infrastructure and logistics, promoting financial inclusion, helping create conditions to attract increased private capital, and helping structure public-private partnerships.