New Delhi, July 13 -- Daksham Capital, a multi-family office that was set up last October, is preparing to launch a venture capital (VC) fund. The move marks the young firm's clear ambition to expand beyond wealth advisory and into alternative asset management, according to people familiar with the matter.
Daksham Capital aims to raise around Rs 250-300 crore ($26-31 million) for the vehicle, which is structured as a Category-II alternative investment fund (AIF). It is targeting a first close of about Rs 150 crore within the next three to four months even as registration formalities are underway.
The fund will primarily back consumer technology companies, alongside select allocations to artificial intelligence businesses. Daksham is also onboarding a dedicated fund manager to lead the strategy.
Instead of chasing early-stage bets, the fund will write cheques of Rs 10-25 crore for Series A or Series A+ rounds. It aims to be among the first or second institutional investors, with room for select follow-on rounds.
The people cited above said much of the capital is expected to come from Daksham's existing wealth management clients, including family offices seeking co-investment opportunities. The firm is also fielding external interest and has already screened over 20 potential deals through its network.
Over the next three to four years, the fund aims to build a portfolio of 12-15 companies, roughly four a year, targeting a net XIRR of around 25% for investors.
Fresh capital, kept close to home
Daksham is also raising about Rs 30 crore for its own operations, restricting this modest round to its client base rather than opening it to external institutional investors.
The firm's four co-founders - group CEO Saket Lakhotia, joint CIOs Pankaj Kedia and Achin Bhardwaj, and COO Astha Mago - have so far bootstrapped the business, committing about Rs 10 crore of their own capital. The firm's founders bring experience from companies including Standard Chartered, ChrysCapital, Citibank and wealth management firm Client Associates, which also manages a VC fund.
The new internal round is expected to comprise 25-30 individual investors, each writing a cheque of Rs 1 crore or more.
Around 70% of these potential investors are existing Daksham clients, while the rest are expected to join as clients through the transaction.
The firm is specifically targeting business families and high-net-worth individuals (HNIs) in non-metro hubs such as Jaipur, Chandigarh, Kanpur, Lucknow, and Hyderabad, markets it views as underserved by major wealth managers who tend to be clustered in India's largest cities.
The capital will be used to strengthen the senior leadership expansion, with plans to add five senior hires, including regional heads for western and southern India. These executives will buy into the holding company's equity rather than just draw a salary. While the founding team's prior experience is concentrated in northern and eastern India, these new hires will anchor its geographic expansion into new territories.
Daksham currently employs 30-35 people and plans to double its headcount to 65-70 by the end of the year.
Betting on a curated PMS
The third leg of Daksham's strategy is a portfolio management service (PMS) focussed on small- and micro-cap listed companies. The firm expects to receive the licence within three to four months.
Unlike the Rs 10-crore minimum relationship size for its core wealth advisory business, the PMS will have a steep entry ticket of Rs 25 crore. The strategy will remain deliberately tight, capped at 50 clients with an initial target of 20-25 investors, due to liquidity constraints in micro-cap investing. The management said the company is not chasing sheer numbers and positioned it as a premium, high-conviction product rather than a scaled offering.
Under the PMS strategy, Daksham has already orchestrated a handful of private deals. Among them, it has helped clients invest over $3 million (Rs 28.7 crore) in an e-waste and battery recycling company through compulsorily convertible preference shares. It also helped investors invest Rs 30 crore in a secondary round of Inox Clean Energy at around Rs 570 per share roughly three months ago, deploying tickets of Rs 50 lakh to Rs 3 crore across its client base. The position has since gained over 35%, coinciding with a primary round that later saw Adar Poonawalla's family office invest Rs 700 crore at a valuation of about Rs 70,000 crore.
Additionally, Daksham is finalizing a Rs 75-crore fundraise for a vending machine company, although the mandate is yet to be signed. The people cited above proffered no further details on this proposed investment.
Further, over the next 12-18 months, Daksham plans to build international investing capabilities, likely through GIFT City. Currently, only 5-7% of client assets are allocated globally, leaving significant room for expansion.
Fast-growing asset base
The expansion follows quick growth in Daksham's core advisory business, which currently manages about Rs 2,200 crore in assets, supported by a client-facing team of just two advisors.
Around Rs 1,500 crore of assets are distribution-linked, while the remainder are under fee-based advisory mandates, a split the firm expects to maintain. Regulatory firewalls prevent it from mixing advisory fees and distribution commissions on the same assets.
Daksham serves around 100 clients, with an average relationship size of Rs 20 crore. Its largest client has invested over Rs 500 crore, while the second-largest has invested Rs 200 crore.
The firm operates through three registered entities: a holding company and two subsidiaries separating its wealth advisory, investment banking and fund management businesses. Investment banking remains a relatively smaller business for now, with four to five curated mandates annually, although the firm may expand this due to strong deal flow.
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from VC Circle.