Nisarg Shah-led early stage venture capital firm Kettleborough VC has launched its second fund with a target corpus of INR 80 Cr.
The VC firm also announced the first close of its second investment vehicle at INR 35 Cr .
The fund is backed by a host of undisclosed investors and family offices based in India and US.
The Fund II aims to back startups across fintech, full stack commerce solutions, vertical SaaS and agentic AI-led platforms. It plans to write an initial cheque in the range of $300K-500K.
In 2022, Kettleborough closed its maiden fund at $5 Mn. The VC firm claims to have backed 12 startups under its Fund I, including Zippmat, InPrime, Finhaat, Elivaas, Sumosave and Gravity among others. The VC is now planning to wrap up its Fund I in the ongoing quarter, followed by undisclosed exits over the next few months.
"Fund I has shown a clear PMF for this thesis-tracking nearly 2x in just about 3 years from the final close-and we are now doubling down with Fund II to back about 10 more such companies," said Shah.
Launched as a Solo GP (General Partner) Fund in late 2021, Kettleborough claims to have invested in more than 30 startups and around 80 follow-on rounds. Shah has also been a seed investor in companies including Homeville, Foxtale and Onebanc from his pre-fund cohort.
The Early-Stage Backbone
While early-stage investments are on the riskier side, several investors across India as well as abroad are intensively backing new startups in the country's startup ecosystem.
Like Kettleborough, there are several VCs which have floated early stage funds to back new companies.
For instance, Prime Venture Partners recently announced its fifth fund with a corpus of $100 Mn to invest in early-stage Indian startups. The fund will primarily target ventures in sectors such as fintech, AI and global SaaS.
Similarly, 360 ONE Asset launched an INR 500 Cr (around $60 Mn) early stage venture capital fund to back seed and Series A startups across sectors, including consumer technology, fintech infrastructure, generative AI, spacetech, defence and precision manufacturing.
Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras is also planning to launch an INR 200 Cr VC fund to back early-stage startups, particularly in the deeptech domain.
As per Inc42's Indian Tech Startup Funding Report H1 2025, Indian seed-stage startups attracted funds worth $406 Mn in the first half of 2025.