Axon Partners Group is an international Investment, Alternative Asset Manager, Corporate Development and Consulting firm, with a proven track record in the digital economy sector, energy, healthcare and emerging markets. It was founded by a group of entrepreneurs with very wide business development and financial experience. Since then, Axon has grown to become a team of over 70 experts worldwide with a winning combination of a global presence, partnered with local expertise.
In India, Axon co-invested with local VC partners in growth stories. We loved India because is a large sub-continent with strong fundamentals, good legal systems and a great entrepreneurial ecosystem. Because of our unique position in India, as the only European/Latin American investor, we are normally preferred partners when companies need investors who can bring know how from Europe, Latam, Middle East or Africa.
I worked as the Investment Manager for India Opportunities Fund, an India-dedicated growth-stage venture capital fund. I helped drive several multi-million exits for the fund and represented Axon on the Board of many portfolio firms.
Portfolio Firms (including Exits)
NxtGen Technology Pte. Limited, Singapore
Captronic Systems Pvt. Ltd
Just Eat India (Exited)
Ampere Vehicles Pvt Ltd (Exited)
iYogi (Exited)
The European Commission and the European Investment Fund (EIF) announced a new pan-European venture capital funds-of-funds programme that will raise €2.1 billion in total to invest in VC funds around Europe. VentureEU will be made up of six funds. To date, the EU has pumped €410 million into this programme with a total target of €2.1 billion. The remaining capital for VentureEU will be raised from independent investors. The Commission and EIF believe this will lead to around €6.5 billion worth of new investments in companies.
The EU’s €410 million investment is made up of €200 million from the Horizon 2020 innovation programme, €105 million from the COSME programme for small and medium-sized businesses, and €105 million from the European Investment Fund via the Juncker Plan. The six chosen funds will invest in several venture capital funds around Europe that back startups and SMEs in tech, digital services, medical technologies, life sciences, and energy. This will benefit around 1,500 startups and scale-ups.
Axon was chosen as one of the six funds, through an application process last year and was the only fund to be selected from Spain. I identified the opportunity (RfP) and was closely involved in the application process. Once we were confirmed, I led to developing a list of corporate companies interested in being an Limited Partner (LP) for Aurora, Axon’s Fund-of-VC-Funds (FoVCF). I was also responsible for developing the screening process and for screening VC funds in Nordics, Turkey and India.