BENGALURU: The International Finance Corporation, the investment arm of the World Bank, is set to back Nandan Nilekani’s Fundamentum, which he started with Helion’s Sanjeev Aggarwal.

Fundamentum raised $ 20 million from Canadian pension fund for its first fund called Fundamentum Partnership – Fund I, as ET reported on Thursday.

According to IFC, Fundamentum is “seeking to raise US$ 100 to 125 million in capital commitment”. IFC proposes an equity investment in the Fund, its website says. As per the site, the investment in Fundamentum is currently pending approval.

“An investment from a lifecycle investor such as IFC will allow the Fund to access co-investment and follow-on capital for its investee companies, as well as, support for subsequent funds. IFC’s experience of investing in mid-stage companies, sector experience, providing board level guidance on strategy / operations and extensive global portfolio of technology companies across several regions will allow for knowledge sharing with the Fund. IFC investment in Fundamentum can play a catalytic role in attracting institutional capital to the under-funded segment of mid-stage venture capital in the Indian ecosystem, which will enable young tech companies to scale-up,’ the institution said.

Fundamentum was started by Nilekani and Aggarwal to offer growth-capital to companies after the Series A round, and is looking to invest in technology enabled companies across sectors such as retail, healthtech, logistics, B2B commerce, and enterprise SaaS.

According to IFC, Funadamentum’s investment in sustainable companies that are solving unique India-centric problems and scaling up their businesses, will contribute meaningfully to job creation and economic growth. IFC’s investment through Fundamentum will “help streamline complex supply chains and transform traditional business models to drive improved access to products and services across multiple in sectors, including health and logistics.”

While the fund is targeted to be around $ 100 million to $ 125 million, the founders have said that the corpus may be extended to $ 200 million if the fund sees more opportunities. They, however, did not comment on the total fund size reached now.

The fund will see one-third of the corpus coming from Nilekani and Aggarwal. Fundamentum has also brought onboard several entrepreneurs who will also invest in the fund. The fund is governed by Vistra ITCL (India) Limited, which will exercise control and supervision over operations.

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Small Biz-The Economic Times