Govt Commits Rs 7,385 Crore Under Fund Of Funds For Startup India Investment

The government on Monday (25 September) said that the Fund of Funds for Startups (FFS) has committed Rs 7,385 crore to 88 Alternative Investment Funds (AIFs) as of 24 September.

The FFS was launched under Startup India initiative in 2016 by the government.

According to a Union Ministry of Commerce and Industry statement, these AIFs in turn have invested Rs 11,206 crore in 720 startups.

FFS, launched with a corpus of Rs 10,000 crore, has been playing a monumental role in mobilising domestic capital in Indian startup ecosystem.

"The corpus is to be built up over 14th and 15th Finance Commission Cycles (FY 2016-2020 and FY 2021-2025) through budgetary support by Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), Ministry of Commerce & Industry," the ministry said.

Under FFS, support is extended to SEBI registered Alternative Investment Funds (AIFs), which in turn invest in startups.

FFS has not only made capital available for startups at early stage, seed stage and growth stage but also played a catalytic role in terms of facilitating raising of domestic capital, reducing dependence on foreign capital and encouraging home grown and new venture capital funds, the ministry said.

"Collectively, the AIFs supported by FFS have a target corpus of over Rs 48,000 crore," it added.

Among the prominent AIFs of leading startup investment firms supported under FFS are Chiratae Ventures, India Quotient, Blume Ventures, IvyCap, Waterbridge, Omnivore, Aavishkaar, JM Financial, Fireside Ventures, and more.

Dunzo, CureFit, FreshToHome, Jumbotail, Unacademy, Uniphore, Vogo, Zostel,Zetwerk etc., are some of the notable startups funded through FFS, the ministry said.

The amount committed under FFS has seen a notable growth over the years recording a CAGR of over 21 per cent since the launch of the Scheme.

Furthermore, Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) which is responsible for operationalising the Scheme has undertaken a series of reforms recently to expedite the drawdowns to enable AIFs assisted under FFS to avail accelerated drawdowns.

"This has created a positive impact and have resulted in year on year (Q1 FY 2021-22 vis-à-vis Q1 FY 2022-23) surge of 100 per cent in the amount of drawdowns," the ministry said.

FFS has helped anchor 67 AIFs out of 88 AIFs supported and 38 of these are first time fund managers which is line with FFS’s core objective of anchoring venture capital investments for Indian startups, it added.

Investments into eligible startups are approximately 3.7 times of FFS disbursements which are well above the minimum stipulated 2 times under the Scheme.

Performing startups supported through FFS are showing a valuation increase by more than 10 times with a number of them even achieving unicorn status (valuation of over $1 billion), the ministry said.

The returns generated from the success of these startups and innovation created will remain within the country and facilitate generation of employment and creation of wealth, it added.