Together Fund is Extending Its Founder-First Philosophy With Its Second SaaS and AI Fund | Entrepreneur

Startups now have unprecedented opportunity to develop totally new AI-native products, form factors, business models, and even software categories. Early adopters can develop and dominate whole markets within weeks or months due to the exponential pace of change.

Together Fund is expanding its founder-first philosophy with its second fund and helping entrepreneurs from the inception stage of their journey in light of this once-in-a-generation SaaS and AI opportunity.

According to Girish Mathrubootham, founding partner of Together Fund, “We are excited to partner with audacious founders who need bold and committed investors with extensive operating experience to guide and accelerate their journey.”

The VC firm on Thursday announced the first close of Together Fund II – its second early stage fund of USD 150 million focused on SaaS and AI startups.

After an initial corpus of USD 85 million in 2021, the second fund will be used to build and scale successful SaaS companies globally while building India as a true Product Nation. Institutional investors in the US and Asia have shown a lot of interest in the first close.

The focus

Together Fund II will focus on finding startups that elevate India as a product nation on the global arena.

The fund will continue to focus primarily on Seed and Series A investments in the range of USD 1 to USD 5 million, but it will also set aside a sizeable portion for later stage investments in portfolio firms who can carry out and scale their vision.

“The bright spot ahead in the business landscape is AI,” said Manav Garg, a founding partner of Together Fund, “and we believe it’s becoming an increasingly indispensable asset for every enterprise to revolutionise existing solutions and deliver unprecedented value to customers.”

The portfolio

To act as early-stage partners to AI-first founders who dream big and are ready to capitalise on the Gen AI paradigm shift, Together Fund has already invested in three Gen AI companies in the healthcare, developer infrastructure, and modern marketing stack during the past three months.

Together Fund has engaged with more than 1,700 startups in just two years and has invested in 20 founding teams across horizontal application areas like sales intelligence, marketing, and recruitment as well as vertical SaaS businesses in healthcare and those pioneering new categories like cloud for connected devices.

Together also has a deep portfolio in developer tools and infrastructure covering modern data stack, no code platform, security and privacy. The portfolio ranges from first-time founders to experienced entrepreneurs, and includes startups from major hubs like Chennai and Bengaluru, to companies in Tier-II cities like Surat.

Kula, Privado, Revenue Hero, Spendflo, Spry, and Toplyne are the six companies that have been successful in securing follow-on funding rounds from global investors.

The market outlook

According to a recent report by Chiratae Ventures and Zinnov, the Indian SaaS market would generate USD 26 billion in sales by 2026. A growth in SaaS and enterprise technology-focused funds has also been attributed to the optimism. Examples include Grayscale Ventures, which announced its first fund in February, and BoldCap, which announced its second fund in April.