South Park Commons continues to expand its global network, setting an ambitious goal to support startups in India with a new fund, raising capital for this project.
Fundraising Efforts and Target Goal
South Park Commons, a collective of engineers, founders, and researchers, is working to raise $40 million for a fund targeting India. This comes six months after their entry into the South Asian market in June.
Founding and Expansion Into India
Founded in 2016 by Facebook’s first female engineer, Ruchi Sanghvi, South Park Commons expanded into India in partnership with Flipkart co-founder Binny Bansal. The Bengaluru-based chapter marked the first global expansion after supporting U.S. startups.
Aditya Agarwal’s Involvement
In 2018, Ruchi Sanghvi was joined by her husband, Aditya Agarwal, a former Dropbox VP of Engineering, as a business partner.
Approach to Funding and Entrepreneur Support
Unlike traditional VC funds and incubators like Y Combinator, South Park Commons focuses on technologists in the “-1 to 0” stage, providing support before they are ready to fundraise. It offers two programs: Community Membership for non-fundraising entrepreneurs, and Founder Fellowship with $1 million in total funding.
Membership and Alumni Network
South Park Commons has 175 active members and over 800 alumni, with 80% being founders and the rest domain experts or researchers.
Leadership Expansion in India
In September, Prateek Mehta, the executive director and CBO of Angel One, was appointed as the founding partner for the India chapter.
Challenges in the Indian Startup Market
India’s startup ecosystem remains challenging, with over 149,000 startups but only 117 unicorns. While global VCs like Accel and Lightspeed remain optimistic, others such as SoftBank and Tiger Global have faced difficulties. Y Combinator’s selection of Indian startups has also declined in recent years.
