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Piper Serica launches Bharat Tech Fund with ₹600 Cr target

What they do

Piper Serica is a Mumbai-based asset manager founded in 2003

It launched the Bharat Tech Fund, a Category II AIF, targeting ₹600 Cr (up to ₹800 Cr with greenshoe)

The fund will invest in Series A and B deeptech startups in sectors like semiconductors and AI

Piper Serica launched the Bharat Tech Fund, a Category II AIF (alternative investment fund).
The fund has a target corpus of ₹600 Cr and a greenshoe option of ₹200 Cr, making the total potential size ₹800 Cr.
It is expected to close by December 2026.
The fund will invest in Series A and Series B startups.
It will back companies in semiconductors, AI, spacetech, defence tech, biosciences, and fintech infrastructure.
Average investment size per company will be ₹25-50 Cr.
The fund aims for a gross IRR of about 30% over a typical six-year holding period.

Deeptech became the third most funded startup segment in 2025 after ecommerce and fintech.
Deeptech startups raised $500 Mn across 87 deals in 2025, and $166 Mn in Q1 2026.
The government relaxed the deeptech entity recognition framework and introduced tax incentives.
Deeptech is a central theme in phase 2 of Startup India FoF with a ₹10,000 Cr corpus.

Piper Serica is a Mumbai-based asset manager founded in 2003 by Abhay Agarwal.
It manages over ₹1,400 Cr in assets across public and private markets.
It has active coverage of over 900 listed Indian companies.
It maintains a network of more than 1,600 family offices, entrepreneurs, and industry experts.
It has evaluated more than 4,000 startups over the years.
It uses a proprietary AI screening tool called Yoda.ai.
It works with IIT Madras, IIT Delhi, IIT Bombay, IISc Bangalore, iDEX, IN-SPACe, and DRDO.