Dallas Venture Capital Raises $80M to Invest Alongside Its $50M India Fund » Dallas Innovates

From left: Abidali Neemuchwala and Dayakar Puskoor [Photo: Dallas Venture Capital]

Dallas Venture Capital wants to eliminate borders when it comes to investing in early-stage startups.

With an office in Irving and another in Hyderabad, India, the venture capital firm has raised $80 million for its second flagship fund. And while it’s in the process of raising its first India-focused fund, Dallas Venture Capital has already begun deploying money in multiple countries.

The fund, which was oversubscribed, is “one of the largest technology-focused funds to operate out of Dallas-Fort Worth,”  Managing Director Dayakar Puskoor said in a LinkedIn post.

“DVC USA plans to invest alongside our $50 million DVC India Fund I, making us a true cross-border VC poised to bootstrap two large start-up ecosystems in the US and India with a combined deployment of approximately $130 million over the next 4-5 years,” he said.

Deploying $130 million over the next four to five years

The firm surpassed its initial target for the Dallas Venture Capital Fund II LP by $5 million. It attracted investors including Gupta Capital Group, NewcrestImage Ventures, Eternal Lotus Capital Partners, and Bioworld Merchandising. Also planning to funnel capital into early- and growth-stage B2B SaaS startups, the DVC India Fund 1 has secured $25 million out of its $50 million target.

Dallas Venture Capital is already helping fuel the growth of tech startups with its new fund.

Pushkoor said fundraising was bootstrapped by the core DVC team that committed to 25% of the fund. That gave DVC a headshart, he said, which led to investment in four companies “even before the formal close of the fund.”

DVC’s first investment from the $80 million fund saw the firm join an $8.5 million funding round in Austin recreational vehicle marketplace Rollick in March 2021. Then in May 2021, it led a $3 million Series A round, which formally closed in January, in Minneapolis AI management startup Lucy. And late last year, Dallas Venture Capital co-led a $13 million Series B funding round for Indian workforce training startup Disprz, alongside Mars Growth Capital.

This year, the firm and Cerium Technology Ventures co-led a $5 million Series A round for Toronto’s Citylitics, a data and intelligence platform for the infrastructure industry.

Dallas Venture Capital’s India fund has also invested in Disprz, in addition to leading a $650,000 “pre-Series A round” in Indian anti-money laundering startup IntelleWings, per website VC Circle.

Dallas Venture Capital focuses on B2B SaaS companies working in emerging tech spaces like AI, machine learning, and extended reality. The firm said it plans to invest in around 20 to 25 companies at the rate of about one per quarter as it deploys the two funds.

DVC typically writes checks between $2 million and $5 million, mostly in the post-product market for companies, with follow-on investments totaling up to $10 million. The firm seeks to accelerate businesses’ revenues from around $1 million to $10 million, according to Dallas Venture Capital Co-Founder and Director Abidali Neemuchwala.

The Dallas Venture Capital ‘advantage’

Dallas Venture Capital does more than provide funding for startups. At the beginning of last year, the firm launched the DVC Advantage program to provide its portfolio companies with “strategic guidance” in areas like product strategy, corporate governance, business development, and talent acquisition.

“The ‘advantage’ for DVC and its stakeholders begins with its partners, venture partners, fund partners, operations partners, and the extensive network of advisors who bring unsurmountable advantage to our portfolio companies,” Puskoor said on LinkedIn.

“A hotbed of innovation”

Formed in 2020, Dallas Venture Capital was launched by Puskoor, who was co-founder of former Irving- and India-based VC firm Naya Ventures. At the time of its launch, the firm went by Dallas Venture Partners. It then brought on Neemuchwala, the former CEO and managing director of Indian IT company Wipro, as a venture partner and co-founder. 

According to Dallas Venture Capital’s website, the firm has 14 companies in its portfolio and has made seven exits.

“Dallas is fast becoming a hotbed for innovation and incubation but needs help with go-to-market acceleration,” Puskoor said at the time of the firm’s launch. We’ll “utilize our time-tested philosophy to ‘invest, engage, collaborate, grow, and exit’ to fund the market acceleration and increase the odds of success through its extensive network of advisors that offer unparalleled mentorship to startups.”

The story was updated on May 25, 2022, at 5:45 p.m., with additional detail about the DVC funds. Quincy Preston contributed to this story.

Get on the list.
Dallas Innovates, every day.

Sign up to keep your eye on what’s new and next in Dallas-Fort Worth, every day.