New Delhi, Sept. 1 -- Elev8 Venture Partners, the growth-stage venture capital fund backed by Venture Catalysts, has made the final close of its debut vehicle at Rs 1,400 crore ($158.7 million). The close comes short of its original $200 million target.

The VC firm said that the fund attracted a diverse base of limited partners (LPs), including leading institutions from Korea, Hong Kong, and India; sovereign fund, large family offices, and several unicorn founders.

Founded in 2023, Elev8 has already deployed one-third of its corpus into five companies: Astrotalk, IDfy, Smallcase, Porter, and Snapmint. Its cheque sizes range between $8 million (around Rs 70.6 crore) and $ 14 million (around Rs 123.5 crore). In several of these investments, Elev8 has co-invested alongside its LPs, including family offices and HNIs.

The remaining two-thirds of the fund will be deployed over the next 12-18 months into high-growth businesses that align with Elev8's investment framework. It primarily invests across four sectors: fintech, SaaS, B2B platforms and consumer brands and platforms.

"Our focus now is to deploy the remaining capital with discipline and support our portfolio companies on their journey towards IPOs and global leadership," said Navin Honagudi, managing partner at Elev8 Venture Partners.

Elev8 had made the first close of its Elev8-Capital Fund 1 at $67 million in August last year. The fund invests primarily in Series B and C rounds of companies. It will invest about 70% of the capital as initial investments, with the remaining 30% reserved for follow-on rounds. It plans to invest in 12 to 14 companies.

The VC firm claims that all the companies are scaling up rapidly, with an annual growth rate of more than 30% while remaining profitable.

Early this year, Elev8 hired former tech strategy at Walmart Global Tech India, Ashpi Gupta, to beef up its investment team. Gupta has nearly two decades of experience across corporate strategy, startup investments, and investment banking.

Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from VC Circle.