Funds managed
| Fund name | Asset class – category | License |
| India Real Estate Investment Fund | Real estate |
About
ICICI Venture was founded in 1988 as the Technology Development and Information Company of India Limited, through a joint venture between the ICICI Limited and Unit Trust of India.
In 1998 it became a wholly owned subsidiary of ICICI Limited and was renamed ICICI Venture Funds Management Company Limited.
ICICI Venture is a wholly owned subsidiary of ICICI Bank Limited (which is the successor entity to ICICI Limited).
In 2002, ICICI Venture migrated from-
(a) early-stage VC investments to late-stage investments, and
(b) proprietary capital-oriented funds to Third Party Capital oriented funds.
By 2019, ICICI Venture’s AUM/A reached $5 billion since inception across all strategies including the erstwhile VC strategy. The ICICI Venture team consists of 60 people including dedicated investment professionals in each business vertical and a multi-functional corporate centre.
The AUM for their real estate business is $ 700 million across 3 funds, since inception. They have made 25+ investments, and over 20 exits with diverse strategies across residential, commercial, and mixed-use real estate.
ICICI Venture RE seeks to leverage certain key growth drivers for the Indian RE industry including higher spending for household assets especially in particular Affordable Housing segment, significant impetus from Government for the Housing industry, better availability of finance, changing real estate developer profiles and reforms implemented in the last few years, especially the Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act 2016.
They are uniquely placed to provide be-spoke private debt financing solutions (and, historically, even private equity solutions) for developers.
Given ICICI Bank’s dominant presence in the Indian real estate market, ICICI Venture RE leverages Group linkages in various areas such as construction financing, housing finance, property services, etc.
Key staff
Puneet Nanda, MD & CEO – Puneet has the responsibility and oversight of all verticals across its diversified alternative asset management platform. He joined ICICI Venture in June 2020. Prior to joining ICICI Venture, he served as Deputy Managing Director of ICICI Prudential Life Insurance. He was closely involved in the IPO of ICICI Prudential Life Insurance which became the first insurance company to be publicly listed in India in 2016 at a valuation of USD 7 billion. Mr Nanda served on the Board of Directors of ICICI Prudential Life Insurance from August 2010 until June 2020. He joined the company at its start-up stage in January 2001 as Head of the Investments function. During his 19+ years at the company, he was responsible for initially building and thereafter nurturing the high-quality investments program of the company across asset classes including public and private equity, public and private debt, real estate and strategic investments. Subsequently, since 2010, his role was expanded to include oversight of other business functions of the company involving over 14,000 personnel across 500+ offices pan India as of March 2020. He has also served on the Board of Directors of ICICI Prudential Pension Funds Management Company as its Non-Executive Director between 2009 and June 2020. Prior to ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, Mr. Nanda has worked at ICICI Securities and J.P. Morgan. Mr. Nanda received a B.E from Malaviya National Institute of Technology, Jaipur and PGDM (Finance and Marketing) from IIM Lucknow.
Mohit Batra, Executive Director – Mohit Batra is the Executive Director on the Board of ICICI Venture, which is ICICI group’s alternative assets company, where he leads the infrastructure practice. He joined ICICI Bank in 1992 and worked in the areas of corporate and project finance across a range of manufacturing sectors. He then moved to Mumbai as a part of ICICI Bank’s newly set up Infrastructure SBU and in 2004 was given the responsibility to Head the Project Finance Group which worked across the entire spectrum of Telecom, Manufacturing, Infrastructure, and Oil & Gas industries. In addition, Mohit was also involved in the strategic finance and advisory services offered by ICICI Bank including M&A, transaction structuring, acquisition financing etc. for the period 2006-07. Mohit has experience of around 150 deals including Public Private Partnerships. He has worked across the entire Capital structure including equity, subordinated /mezzanine debt and senior debt with total financing committed of around USD 36 billion. Mohit has operated at the board level of companies and has had hands on experience in project finance, corporate banking, equity investing, strategic finance and resolution of stressed assets. He has in the past worked on several infrastructure policy initiatives undertaken by the Government in the areas of power, telecom and roads. At ICICI Venture, Mohit is responsible for infrastructure investments including Resurgent Power, which is a Power Platform co-sponsored with Tata Power for buy-out of Indian power assets. Resurgent has recently completed the acquisition of Prayagraj Power Generation Company, a 1980 MW supercritical plant as part of the stressed asset resolution process initiated by the lenders. Mohit is an engineer and has an MS in Management from Purdue University, USA.
Beena Chotai, CFO – Beena has been associated with ICICI Venture for over two decades in various capacities and is currently the Chief Financial Officer of the organization. She has been involved in setting up and structuring exits of several domestic and cross border funds and is also credited with the restructuring of a cross border fund having investments in various countries, an assignment that was a first of its kind. Currently, she is overseeing the accounting, audit, taxation and treasury function and is actively involved in the designing of internal controls and monitoring process for some of the portfolio companies. She has extensively worked on devising cross border tax efficient structure for deals. She has played an active role in defining and shaping the regulatory environment of the industry and is credited for a number of measures introduced by the regulators to encourage the industry. She has participated in the Dr Lahiri committee set up by SEBI to recommend changes to the regulatory environment of the industry and has made representations to several regulatory authorities including SEBI, RBI & CBDT. She is a qualified Chartered Accountant and has completed an Executive Development Program at Harvard University, USA & has attended various programmes organised by the European Venture Capital Association, UK .
Manish Desai, Senior Vice President-Real Estate – Manish started as Chief Manager in ICICI Bank in 2002, where he served for 4 years before joining ICICI Venture in 2006 as Vice President. He has been in the organisation for 15 years now and has spearheaded the Asset Management function of all real estate funds. He is currently overseeing and monitoring various aspects of construction projects spread across the country. Prior to joining ICICI Bank, he has worked as Deputy Manager at Shopper’s Stop in 2000. He has a Bachelor’s degree in Construction Engineering from Mumbai University, which he passed first class with Honors. He also has a Post Graduate Diploma in Advanced Construction Management where he stood first in his batch with a CPI (Cumulative Performance Index)of 9.83 out of 10.
Awadh Agrawal, Vice President & Principal-Real Estate – Awadh started as an industrial trainee in ICICI Bank in 2003, and soon became the Manager Treasury MOG in 2004. He has been serving as the Vice President at ICICI Venture for 15+ years, since 2005. He is a qualified Chartered Accountant and has certifications in Financial Risk Management, Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst, as well as Chartered Financial Analyst.
Puneet Bhatia, Senior Director-Real Estate – Puneet joined ICICI Venture as Senior Director-Real Estate in August 2019. He had also worked with ICICI Bank from 2000 to 2006 as Head of Land Advisory. He has also worked with numerous well-known firms like JLL, Wells Fargo, Shapoorji Pallonji Investment Advisors, Edelweiss, and Mirae Asset. He obtained his B. Com from Delhi University, and MBA from IGNOU. He also has qualification from Institute of Cost and Work Accountants of India. He is a Fellow of the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors (FRICS) for Real Estate Finance.
Pradeep Rohilla, Director-Real Estate – Pradeep started as a Branch Sales Manager (Mortgages) in ICICI Bank in 2002, climbing up the corporate ladder and soon becoming the Zonal Business Head (Mortgages) in 2006. He joined ICICI Home Finance in 2008 where he was the Business Head – Real estate Transaction & Advisory, responsible for developing operation strategy and overall business plan for residential & commercial real estate consulting. He then went on to become the Business Head for Mortgages in 2011, where he led a start-up enterprise and set up a strong team of 150 mortgage professionals ( sales, credit under writing, product, policy and risk functions ) pan India & successfully rolled out the business across 300 cities in India. He managed AUM of Rs 8000 crore and incremental mortgage business of Rs 200 crore per month.
He joined ICICI Venture in October 2014 as Principal in the Real estate team, which he served for 4 years before becoming the Director – Real Estate in May 2019. He led the investments and exits of series 2 structured debt fund besides leading the exits of series 1 equity fund. He has also worked at Parle as Management Trainee & Franchise executive, and at Henkel Spic India Ltd as Area Sales Manager before joining ICICI Bank. He specializes in private equity, structured finance, mortgage finance, construction finance, investment banking, and credit management & operations. His educational qualifications include B. Sc. (hons) in Electronics from Delhi University, and a PGDBM in Marketing & Finance.
Vikash Maskara, Principal-Real Estate – Vikash joined ICICI Venture in 2008 as Principal in the Real Estate vertical of the organisation. He has been actively involved in and concluded many investments, monitored portfolio companies, and successfully exited portfolio companies. Before ICICI Venture, he was an Analyst at JP Morgan Chase in 2006-2008. He is a Chartered Accountant, and has an MBA in Finance-Investment Banking from SP Jain Centre of Management.
Media
December 26, 2018: Prashant Purker, MD & CEO at ICICI Venture, says that they plan to expand across all verticals and add new lines of business which includes expansion in private debt for affordable housing through their new fund iREIF (India Real estate Investment Fund).
Title: Role of AIF Industry in Nation building, VCCircle, February 2021
https://www.vccircle.com/role-of-aif-industry-in-nation-building/
They believe 2020 has served as an inflection point for many sectors and companies given rapid digitalization and this theme will prevail in the forthcoming period. They believe financial inclusion will remain a key focus area going forward. They also believe that the credit space will see greater innovation than before. REIT and InvIT markets will see greater activity than before. Affordable housing continues to have a huge run-way for growth. Office sector will see a shift in design and philosophy with wellness and proximity to residential hubs becoming more relevant aspects.
ICICI Venture’s objective is to remain at the forefront of innovation within the AIF industry going forward and create appropriate product solutions for various categories of LPs. Across their various business areas, they remain bullish on BFSI, healthcare, consumer products and services, specialty manufacturing, branded apparel, etc. They will also have extra focus on digital, tech in the post pandemic world. In Real Estate, we remain bullish on affordable housing. They feel optimistic about offices but feel that Covid will change the narrative from large campuses to mid-sized offices. Other spaces such as logistics, warehousing, data centres could also be interesting. Another could be distressed spaces within realty triggered by Covid. In Infra, energy, clean tech, renewables and transportation will remain important focus areas. Asset monetization initiatives by the Government can also create opportunities. In Special Sits, dislocations in Indian credit markets in the last 3 years would open hitherto untapped opportunities for local AIF Managers like us.
In general, there is a clear opportunity for ICICI Venture to grow faster. But competition for third party capital will only intensify and on-going consolidation trends in the global LP community will create a greater thrust on survival of the fittest.
Title: The New Normal for Alternative Investments, VCC TV, February 2021
Puneet Nanda, ICICI Venture’s MD & CEO, spoke at the VCCircle Limited Partners Summit 2021. Puneet Nanda says that despite the challenges of 2020, there has been a lot to learn. The year reemphasized the need to stick to basics, i.e., irrespective of market conditions and cycles, the basic job of finding the right companies with the right management, governance, outlook and optimistically, the right outcomes remain the same. In investing, asset allocation plays a crucial role and that got intensified further. At the same time, it reinforced the need to be nimble, proactive and not take things for granted.
Overall, Nanda’s view, a year down the line since the pandemic struck is that India has managed the scenario reasonably well. And going back over the last decade, the AIF industry has accounted for $250 billion of long-term sticky capital for India.
Title: How GPs and LPs steered portfolio firms away from trouble during the pandemic, VCC TV, March 2021
Mohit Batra, ICICI Venture’s Executive Director, spoke at the VCCircle Limited Partners Summit 2021. When asked about adding value in the infrastructure segment when the promoters are not as open minded, Mohit said that they took a very differentiated investment strategy – that they’ll only make controlled investments. To work towards that they believe that only being a GP is not enough, one needs a good partner. They got a good strategic partner and created a company called Resurgent Power, which buys distressed assets in the power space. They co-created and controlled their own destiny.
Mohit says that they don’t do any green field projects, they only do downfield or last—mile projects. They only do projects that have maximum 24 months left to completion. For one such plant project in Uttar Pradesh, they had set up a large working capital line, because they knew the cash flows were going to be tight due to the pandemic, which they could draw down and they had flexibility to keep running the plant even though they weren’t getting any payments for a long time. He says that it is always good to have liquidity when it comes to stressed assets.
Title: Magma HDI general insurance raises Rs 525 cr from various investors, Business Standard, March 2021
ICICI Venture, Morgan Stanley Private Equity Asia along with Cyza Chem (a Poonawala Group company) and two family offices are investing Rs 525 crore in Magma HDI General Insurance, a JV between Magma Fincorp and HDI Global SE (Germany). The transaction included a primary capital raise of Rs 250 crore, and a secondary sale of Rs 275 crore.
The secondary sale would enable Magma Fincorp and its group companies to comply with RBI’s guidelines for ownership of stake in insurance companies, while the primary capital would provide growth capital to meet the needs of expanding distribution capabilities.
“We are excited about the prospects offered by the under-penetrated Indian insurance sector”, said Puneet Nanda, Managing Director & Chief Executive Officer, ICICI Venture.
Magma HDI General Insurance’s MD & CEO, Rajive Kumaraswami, said that the growth capital brought in by the investors would enable the company to expand the business and explore new opportunities.
Title: ICICI Ventures’ realty fund invests in Platinum Corp’s 2 projects in Mumbai’s Andheri suburb, Economic Times, April 2021
ICICI Ventures Fund Management’s India Real Estate Investments Fund has invested Rs 55 crore in realty developer Platinum Corp’s two projects in Andheri suburb of Mumbai.
The funds from the investment, structured as a quasi-debt transaction, will be used in the developer’s two projects for payment of floor space index (FSI) premium to civic authorities and to secure all relevant permissions.
Analyst questions
1. Why is there no information about your funds on the website ?
2. What is your investment philosophy ?
3. How would you describe your investment style ?
4. What process do you follow for your investments ?
Prepared by – Praptee Chakote, September 2021
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