Matrix Partners India has elevated Pranay Desai as its managing director, promoting him from the role of Partner.
As per Matrix Partners India’s website, Desai is now the managing director of the firm.
“Pranay joined us three years ago and has catalysed our presence in the Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) space. We wish him the very best as he scales the SaaS franchise,” Vikram Vaidyanathan, existing managing director of Matrix, wrote in an internal email to employees and portfolio companies, Moneycontrol reported.
A mail sent to Matrix Partners India on the development didn’t elicit any response till the time of publishing this story.
Desai became a part of Matrix in 2021, where his primary role involved spearheading investments in B2B Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) ventures. During his tenure, he closely collaborated with various portfolio companies such as Moengage, Rocketlane, Superops, 100ms, Murf, and Toddle.
Before joining Matrix, Desai served as the director of growth marketing at Freshworks, a company listed on Nasdaq. In the later part of his career at Freshworks, he led a team of over 40 marketing and creative professionals and owned revenue-focused marketing objectives for its customer service products.
Matrix Partners India recently increased the size of its fourth India-focussed fund to $525 Mn from $450 Mn earlier. The announcement came a year after it was reported that the Indian arm of the US-based private equity investment firm was raising a $450 Mn fund targeted largely at Indian startups.
The PE firm counts some of the biggest Indian startups in its portfolio, including Razorpay, OfBusiness, Ola, VerSe. Matrix India has as many as 10 unicorns in its portfolio and is one of the biggest investors in the country.
Elderly-focussed lifestyle platform Genwise and wealthtech startup Stable Money are among the most recent startup investments of Matrix Partners India.
Earlier this year, early-stage venture capital firm Fireside Ventures also elevated three of its partners – Kannan Sitaram, Vinay Singh, and Dipanjan Basu – to the role of cofounders.
While the funding in the Indian startup ecosystem has dried up since the onset of the funding winter last year, investors seem to be sitting on a large amount of dry powder to invest when the situation improves. As per Inc42 data, 52 funds worth $3.8 Bn have been announced so far this year targeted for the Indian startup ecosystem.
The post Matrix Partners India Promotes Pranay Desai As Managing Director appeared first on Inc42 Media.
