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American VC to splurge on Indian BPOs

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CIOL Bureau
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BANGLORE: The Indian BPO sector is hot and happening. It has attracted global attention for the good and worse and now it is attracting venture capitalist firms too.



Palo Alto based Oak Investments Partners is eyeing the Indian BPO and ITES sectors to invest in. "This will be our first investment in this sector globally," said Fredric Harman, General Partner, Oak Investment.



It is focussed on investing in companies either at early stage or late stage. While investment in companies at early stage would attract $10 to $20 million, late stage would attract $20 to $80 million also depending on special situation. However Oak is interested in investing in BPO and ITES companies in India, which are in the process of witnessing inorganic growth through mergers and acquisitions or expanding overseas.



The company has earmarked an investment of $320 million for India. "We are in initial discussion with a handful of companies in the BPO, ITES and IT Services sectors and we are bullish about our growth in India," said Ranjan Chak, Venture Partner, Oak Investment Partners.



The 25 year old venture capitalist had recently acquired the controlling stake in Washington based Talisma Corporation and merged it with Vancouver based Pivotal to form one of the largest CRM company for the mid-size market. Both the companies have off-shore development centers in India.



Further Oak has invested in eight other overseas companies, which are focussing on leveraging the India opportunity factor. The services extended by these companies in India are setting up of development centers, professional services, technical support, sales and back office functionality. The names of the companies are Aventail, Evident Software, Excel Switching Corporation, XIOtech, Cencerto and Melita. The last of the two companies are also merged in to a single entity similar to Talisma and Pivotal.

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