Celesta plans to make four to six new investments in India per year going forward – averaging about one per quarter – with deal sizes starting at $1-5 million depending on the opportunity, managing partner Arun Kumar told ET.
“Anand is well-known in the Indian ecosystem as a leading seed investor,” Kumar said. “One of our differentiators is the strength of the US-India connection that we bring to bear in our fund and for our entrepreneurs, and Anand who has worked and invested in both countries is a perfect fit for where Celesta is going.”
Chandrasekaran has previously served as a partner at General Catalyst and been a product executive at Meta, Bharti Airtel, and Snapdeal. Most recently, he cofounded AI-native contact centre startup Crescendo AI, of which he is president.
He will continue at Crescendo as he transitions into his role at Celesta.
Chandrasekaran’s expertise in consumer and enterprise software is expected to complement Celesta’s track record in the hardware and semiconductor space, with a particular focus on opportunities within the AI tech stack.
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Currently, about 15% of Celesta’s 105-strong investment portfolio comprises Indian startups, including drone-maker Ideaforge, AI-powered diagnostics startups OneCell and 5C Networks, semiconductor design company Aura Semiconductor, and space startup Agnikul Cosmos.“If you saw the start of the India-for-the-world kind of company – and we’re already seeing this in SaaS (software-as-a-service) – as a thesis, we think this will expand to other areas of deeptech,” said Chandrasekaran, noting areas like AI, defence, manufacturing, crypto infrastructure, and energy and climate.
Celesta can bring credibility, deep experience, and deep access to India’s ambitious founders, he said.
The firm is looking at further deal opportunities among fabless semiconductor, space, and bioconvergence startups.
“The global capability centres of the large companies in India have tens of thousands of very qualified semiconductor designers, and we expect that, as happens in the US, people will step out and start new companies,” Kumar said.
Celesta founding managing partner Sriram Viswanathan and senior advisor A Paulraj are part of the India Semiconductor Mission advisory committee.
Capital efficiency is a very attractive part of investing in India, Kumar said, adding that Celesta expects to play a part in the Indian startups who are looking to scale globally.
After a lull in the VC ecosystem over the past few years, the outlook for 2025 and beyond is upbeat, the investors said, driven by the macro trends of India’s strong GDP growth, the theme of resilience, and deeper collaboration with the US on emerging technologies amid geopolitical reconfigurations.
They also highlighted the cultural change in India over the past decade towards a greater acceptance of entrepreneurial risk-taking.
