In these hard times when the global economy has been deeply impacted because of the Covid-19 pandemic, Sequoia India’s accelerator program Surge has invested in the Indian startups. The accelerator fund ‘Surge’ has backed 15 startups across India and Southeast Asia.
Rajan Anandan, the executive who previously ran Google’s business in India and Southeast Asia, leads the Surge initiative. The $200-million fund has made seven investments in the country across sectors in its third batch, taking its overall Surge portfolio to 52 startups.
The latest batch includes Atlan, which helps teams in large enterprises collaborate on data projects, community management platform Convosight, subscription-based smart water purifier product DrinkPrime, online fitness app Fittr, digital procurement platform Procol, site reliability engineering platform Last9, and a consumer brand in stealth.
The hands-on approach of the accelerator and its highly resourceful community of investors and mentors could be key for startups to deal with the many challenges in a tough global business environment, some Surge entrepreneurs said.
“The (Sequoia) network has been incredibly hands-on – right from making customer introductions to hiring…the (Surge) program itself is MBA on steroids for entrepreneurs…it is a privilege to learn from partners who’ve backed the most legendary global technology companies of our times from Zoom to Github,” said Prukalpa Sankar, cofounder of Atlan. A third of Surge’s latest batch have at least one female founder.
Surge program gives each startup a $1.5 million check and participation in a four-month program that’s split across India and Singapore, as well as the wider Sequoia global presence in China and San Francisco.
“The collective community aspect of Surge makes it a lot more powerful. We’ve had instances where Surge founders share with each other feedback on investors, reference checks for senior hires enabling them to avoid bad actors,” said Ravish Naresh, founder of Khatabook, a digital ledger app for entrepreneurs.
Mirroring this sentiment, Abhimanyu Saxena, cofounder of Scaler Academy, a Surge 01 startup said, “everyone participates in discussions and shares resources, which are particularly valuable in the current situation with Covid-19.”
Since its launch in March last year, Surge has grown into a community of more than 110 founders from 52 startups, spread across six countries. According to Sequoia, Surge startups have raised more than $250 million after completing their program in subsequent financing rounds.
“We are proud to be able to partner with this current cohort of ambitious founders who are building their companies in one of the most challenging periods in modern history”, said Rajan Anandan, Managing Director, Surge and Sequoia Capital India LLP. Other companies in the current cohort from Southeast Asia include Pencil, Pentester Academy, Tigerhall, Tinvio, BukuKas, CoLearn, Hangry, and Thuocsi.
HrNxt.com Newsdesk has researchers and writers with an excellent domain knowledge about the talent ecosystem, and the business environment. The team keeps a tab on the latest happenings in the ecosystem to bring most relevant news and insights for our readers. You can connect with our newsdesk at newsdesk@hrnxt.com.