Investments by PE-VCs grow 3x in Jan to $5.1 billion

CHENNAI: The Omicron variant did not deter private markets in India as value of private equity (PE) and venture capital (VC) investment rose 3x year-on-year in January 2022.
Last month, 123 PE-VC deals worth over $5. 1 billion were clocked compared to 81 deals of $1. 7 billion, according to data from Venture Intelligence. Sequentially, investments grew by around 42% compared to December. Large growth capital rounds contributed to the upswing in the month as the number of deals over $100 million stood at 15 — up almost 4x from the year-ago period with just four deals.
Early stage investments also enjoyed a boost increasing from 43 deals of $149 million in January 2021 to 67 deals for $312 million in January 2022.
IT and IT-enabled sectors continued to account for a large chunk of deals at more than 70%. Emerging sectors such as crypto registered a 5x growth in investments from December 2021, as January 2022 recorded six deals worth over $27 million in the crypto sector. Google’s investment in Airtel of over $700 million, Swiggy’s $700-million raise led by Invesco making the food tech giant a decacorn, and Fractal Analytics raising $360 million from TPG Capital and entering the unicorn club, were the major deals this month.