Together Fund to back 25 AI startups betting on faster revenue scaling

CHENNAI: Together Fund plans to back around 25 artificial intelligence startups through its second fund with an average deal size of $3 million to $ 5million, its co-founder and managing partner Manav Garg told TOI. He said the $150million fund is expected to be disbursed in 24 months.

It will back seed stage, series A startups working on AI application layer, building solutions on top of foundational models and infrastructure layer, such as building agent automation, testing, among others. Together plans to announce a slew of Series A investments in Indian AI startups in a few months.

The fund, founded by Garg and Girish Mathrubootham in 2021, initially focused on software as service (SaaS) startups. Garg said AI startups with verticalisation, solving domain problems have the ability to scale revenue much faster than SaaS players.

“In the next three to seven years, around seven of our portfolio companies will touch $100 million revenue. Currently, 18 out of 24 (excluding new startups) portfolio companies are revenue generating with seven making above half a million dollars and four AI-focused companies expected to cross $10 million dollars this year,” Garg said.

The fund has so far backed 31 startups, including 16 AI-first startups. “We have been funding AI startups for the past 24 months along with SaaS startups and it is not really a pivot,” he said.

He said they are getting applications from 200 startups every month and will look for founders with deep technical or domain expertise. Together Fund primarily focuses on the US markets and has invited AI startups working in B2B applications, healthcare, security, automation and defense applications for its venture building program with up to $1 million funding and mentorship. Freshworks founder and executive chairman Girish Mathrubootham in a LinkedIn post said they are building the next wave of AI giants.

“AI is transforming industries at an unprecedented pace, and we believe the most groundbreaking companies of the next decade will be AI-first. At Together Fund, we are doubling down on our commitment to back bold AI founders who are reimagining the future,” he said.


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