unitus ventures: VC firm Unitus Ventures brings on board Sanjiv Rangrass and Raj Nooyi

Early-stage venture capital (VC) firm Unitus Ventures has brought on board sustainability veteran Sanjiv Rangrass and global leader Raj Nooyi.

Rangrass joins as a venture partner and will lead the firm’s investment strategy in the climate sector – a focus sector for the next fund the VC firm will launch early next year. Nooyi joins as venture advisor, and his global experience will help Unitus’ portfolio companies to scale globally.

The firm, which has backed startups such as CueMath, GigForce, Masai School and CareerNinja, is planning to close its third fund in India next year with a corpus of $100 million, cofounder and managing partner Will Poole told ET in November.

With the third fund, it will increase its focus on areas such as job-tech, enterprise software as a service (SaaS), and sustainability and climate. The VC firm started raising money for the fund late last year.
“Sanjiv and Raj will play a pivotal role in supporting our portfolio companies in their next phase of growth and international expansion. Sanjiv’s extensive experience in agritech and sustainability will form the anchor for our investment strategy in the climate sector for our next fund, and Raj brings deep global operating experience which will help our portfolio companies in their international expansion efforts,” said Surya Mantha, managing partner, Unitus Ventures.

Rangrass has worked for four decades at ITC, where he joined as a trainee and became the CEO of the company’s agribusiness unit before retiring in June this year as the conglomerate’s group head for R&D, sustainability, and projects.

He is an active investor and mentor to startups including unicorns such as Zetwerk and BlackBuck. He has also made investments in various agritech startups such as Vegrow, Absolute Foods, Krishify, Farmart, Loopworm, and AgNext, as well as invested in climate-focused companies like Metastable Materials and Wastelink.

Nooyi brings 35 years of experience of working with leading companies such as Hewlett Packard, PRTM, Tata Consultancy Services, and IBM, where he led the design, development, and implementation of solutions to improve supply chains, accelerate product innovation and effect organisational change at a global level.

“I’ve been working with the Unitus team for the last one-two years, and what I’ve seen is that startups – not only within the Unitus domain but also others – have brilliant ideas, but the founders need support on the technical side, to make sure they’re running a marathon and not just a short sprint. My role will be to help them with governance and aid them in their entire journey, with coaching and mentoring,” said Rangrass.

There is a flurry of entrepreneurial activity addressing different aspects relating to climate change, ranging from sustainable agriculture to mobility and energy management, Rangrass added.

“These are early days and the sector has massive potential for new companies to emerge, which will create millions of jobs and investor value while addressing the challenge at scale,” he said.

Nooyi said the VC firm has initial interest in a couple of companies for international expansion – one related to the gig workforce and the other to learning and development of blue-collar workers.

“I’ve worked in both the corporate and development sectors, seen how both work, and my preference was to try to drive change and positive social advancement through impact investing. Unitus has been investing in some important areas such as healthcare, job technology, etc. What is critical is access to jobs in terms of raising income and skilling of resources, for a country to increase its economic power. I’m quite optimistic about the road ahead,” Nooyi told ET.

Funding winter notwithstanding, Rangrass is optimistic about the startup ecosystem.

“I still see enough funding happening. We’re all looking for good ideas which also pay attention to good governance and not burning too much cash. Climate is an area with massive potential and we can expect to see more action in it,” Rangrass said.

Launched in 2012, Unitus Ventures is based in Bengaluru and Seattle.