AUM Ventures Launches INR 750 Cr Fund To Support DeepTech and IP-Led Startups

AUM Ventures on Friday announced the launch of its second fund with a target corpus of INR 750 crore (USD 80 million approximately) to support Indian founders building IP-driven, innovation-led companies. Called AUM Ventures – India Innovation Fund II, the fund is a SEBI registered Category II AIF. 

The VC has also appointed Nisha Shah as a General Partner for Fund II. Shah in her previous roles has held leadership positions for a large family office and worked for venture capital and private equity firms while being with consulting firms.   

“India’s DeepTech ecosystem is witnessing strong momentum, driven by several structural tailwinds. Government is prioritizing internalizing strategic technologies and reducing dependence on external supply chains, creating new opportunities for Indian innovation. At the same time, India continues to benefit from one of the world’s largest STEM talent pools, which demonstrate strong capital efficiency, developing technologies at 5–10x lower cost than global peers,” the firm said in a statement. 

The new fund will focus on  pre-seed and seed-stage startups, with initial cheque sizes ranging from USD 750,000 to USD 2 million and then provide follow-on capital up to Series A or B stages. The Fund II is expected to support approximately 25 to 30 portfolio companies. 

The VC said that it aims to evaluate tech/IP-led businesses on their capabilities of competing at a global scale at an early stage. Since inception in 2022, AUM Ventures has deployed nearly USD 30 million across 24 early-stage startups with a special emphasis on the deeptech sector. 

It pointed out that it was an early investor in Skyroot Aerospace which went on to become India’s unicorn from the spacetech sector. The VC has also backed four more companies in spacetech including Cosmoserve Space and Sanyark space. 

Other deeptech focused companies that AUM Ventures has supported include Azimuth AI which is building custom SoC. Sharang Shakti, a defence tech company backed by the VC, was recently acquired by Deepinder Goyal’s LAT Aerospace. 

“The companies building in deeptech needs to think global from day one. Further, given the long gestation, company building requires long term strategy, milestone based fund raising, strategic global GTM and building strong leadership teams. We remain excited to work closely with the next generation of founders in these domains as they build companies that make India proud and create lasting impact for the nation and the world,” said Chetan Mehta, Founding Partner, Aum Ventures, in a statement.