Avigo Capital Partners has roped in Girija Tripathy from advisory firm Singhi Advisors as one of the partners for the SME focused mid market private equity fund manager.
He will be the third partner in Avigo Capital, besides the founding partner Achal Ghai and the general partner S. Harikrishnan, who is currently leading all mid-market investments for the firm.
Tripathy who is being designated as the CIO for Avigo has around 14 years of experience in the PE industry had moved to Singhi Advisors Ltd., a Mumbai based boutique advisory firm, as a director in March this year. Before that he was a investment principal at Actis. Prior to joining the buyout specialist private equity firm, Tripathy was with CDC, which he joined in 1997.
Actis was formed in July 2004 as a spinout of CDC Group plc (formerly the Commonwealth Development Corporation), an organisationestablished by the UK Government in 1948 to invest in developing economies in Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean. The Actis management team acquired majority ownership of CDC's emerging markets investment platform.
Tripathy was part of the Actis team that saw through the groundbreaking investment in Punjab Tractors which was also India's first successful private equity-backed privatisation. He is a board member of Swaraj Automotives Limited- a part of Swaraj Engines, a public listed company promoted jointly by Mahindra & Mahindra and Kirloskar Industries. Prior to joining CDC he was with Lazard India.
Given Tripathy's experience in the buyouts space, it is likely that Avigo Capital will now progressively move towards making some bets on control transactions. Recently, it roped in its limited partner for a controlling stake in the fashion apparel company Spykar Lifestyles Pvt Ltd. However, Tripathy told VCCircle that the firm will largely make growth investments in established companies growing at a CAGR of 35 per cent.
Industry sources also say that Vivek Subramaniam, one of the earlier partners at Avigo Capital has transitioned out of the private equity firm. Avigo Capital has not independently confirmed the same.
Avigo has been active in the Indian private equity space since 2003. It manages a growth and a buyout SME fund in India and it is now managing approximately $365 million across three funds. Avigo is currently investing out of its third fund which had its final closing in June, 2010, at $240 million. It is currently sitting on uninvested capital of close to $100 million out of its third fund.
Some of the recent investments made into the portfolio companies of Avigo include fashion retailer Spykar, material handling company Tecpro Systems and infrastructure service firm AMR Constructions among others.
