PE firm ChrysCapital raises $600 million from several investors

Homegrown private equity outfit, ChrysCapital, has raised a seventh fund accumulating $600 million from investors such as the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation (GIC) and Harvard Management Company, its managing director and head of fundraising, Gaurav Ahuja, told ET.

The fund, which was set up in the late 1990’s, was among the founding investors in publicly traded Yes BankBSE 0.28 % and counts amongst its portfolio of past investments, blue chip companies such as Idea CellularBSE 0.46 %, Axis BankBSE 2.39 % and HCL.

The latest fund was raised in a little over a year “despite tough fundraising environment facing Indian private equity firms,” said a ChrysCapital note.

“This is a large fundraise by any standard and clearly indicates that investor sentiment is positive towards India”, said Ashwath Rau, Senior Partner at law firm AZB & Partners.

Founded by Ashish Dhawan, ChrysCapital witnessed a management transition five years ago when Dhawan decided to step down and pursue other interests. Kunal Shroff, a veteran who had been with the fund since its inception, stepped into Dhawan’s role eventually and now leads the firm. The latest fund has attracted interest from a combination of investors, referred to as limited partners (LP) in the industry, that include insurance companies, university endowments, and family offices, ChrysCapital said.

ChrysCapital has made 80 investments in India and exited 60 of these since its inception. The fund claims to have realised over $4 billion from the sale of its investments. “We have backed top quality entrepreneurs over the years. Our ability to invest in listed securities and private securities has provided us the flexibility to provide healthy returns across our portfolio at any given point in time,” said Sanjiv Kaul, partner at ChrysCapital.