Over the years, we have seen foreign investment firm warm up to Indian startups. Innovative technology and abundance of tech-savvy talent has drawn Chinese, SE Asian, Japanese and Middle-East firms to India. Another one to the kitty is Cocoon Ventures, a Dubai based Venture Capital firm, primarily focuses on making investments in early-stage Information Technology and Internet of Things (IoT) software companies.

Speaking to Entrepreneur India at the World Startup Expo, Nebu K Abraham, Co-founder and Managing Director of the venture, spoke about Cocoon’s investment plans in India.

The firm has already made three investments in India in the band-width of $300,000 but has not made it public yet, Nebu said.

“We have signed $20 mln as our investment plans as part of the expo which we plan to disperse over the course of the year. We are in the process of meeting startups,” he added.

Parameters to be considered

“Two main criteria – in early stage wherein we look only at the idea, a strong team, a proper three-year plan and a working program,”

“When it comes to those startups that are doing business for two years or so, our parameters remain the same but the only difference in this case is we look at the revenue generation part of the business. – which varies from sector to sector,” he added.

Why Indian Startups?

Nebu, who is a resident of Dubai and of Indian origin, said that many of the startup model in Dubai are modelled around existing ideas. “One of the key reasons why we are coming to India is that there is tremendous boom in the number of startups. Secondly, due to the number ofbenefits the government is giving we are seeing a lot of change into the entrepreneurial ecosystem,” he said.

Nebu said that sectors like AI, robotics that are prevalent in India today have a very good market in the Middle-East.He plans to not only invest in these startups, but also help these technology startups to penetrate intothe ME market.