Where exceptional builders meet exceptional co-founders

Vineet Agarwal is an Investment Manager at Antler India. He executes investments at Antler India and helps raise capital for Antler India Fund. In his last stint, he was a core member of the Strategy division at Ola and was involved in multiple fundraises ($500m+) and M&A activity across Ola Group. Previously, he was at Goldman Sachs (Investment Banking) where he worked on deals worth $40bn+. Vineet is a 2x founder, and founded Motorhood (a vehicle maintenance startup) & BluGanesha Airwaves (a proximity marketing venture). He holds an MBA from NMIMS Mumbai and a Bachelors in Commerce from St. Xavier's College, Kolkata.

Varun is a part of the Investments team at Antler India, focusing on early-stage consumer internet businesses, D2C brands & Web 3. He holds a Bachelors degree in Commerce from St. Xavier's College (Autonomous), Kolkata where he pursued Chartered Accountancy and dropped out as a finalist.

Susmit Patodia is the Capital Director at Antler India. Susmit has worked with Motilal Oswal across various roles. His last assignment was in Asset Management Company where he was a Portfolio Manager. His themes of “Anti-Fragile Investing in India”, “Don’t Bet Against India” and “Return to not normal but better” connected with investors. Prior to this, he headed the Institutional Equities Sales business of Motilal Oswal. He has also worked with Accenture Management Consulting where he was adjudged the best associate in the pool. Susmit holds a postgraduate degree from IIM Bangalore.

Samiksha works as an Investment Associate with Antler India. She focuses on Founder Scouting, where she helps identify super passionate founders building for the future. Prior to this, she worked as an Analyst at 3one4 Capital and interned with EY in Zurich in the TAS department. She is an alumnus of The Shri Ram College of Commerce, University of St. Gallen, and IE Business School.

Rohan is a part of the Portfolio Management team at Antler India.Post his under-graduation from St. Xavier's College, Mumbai, he joined a 0-to-1 SaaS expert network startup Lynk Global as one of the founding members at their India office. Following the success of this office, Rohan moved to New York and Toronto to set up Lynk's North America business.His most recent stint involved leading growth and GTM initiatives at xto10x, a startup that supports other companies in their scaling journey.

Rajiv is a Partner in the Antler Bangalore office, where he is leading the deployment of Antler in India. Rajiv co-founded Urban Ladder (UL), India's top omni-channel furniture brand. Over ~8 years, UL raised over $100Mn in venture capital from top Indian VCs and changed the way Indians shop for furniture online. Prior to Urban Ladder, he served as a Senior Product Manager with Yahoo. He has been featured on GQ Influential Young Indians and repeatedly on the Fortune 40 Under 40 India list. Rajiv loves working with early-stage entrepreneurs on product, culture and brand to build scalable companies.

Rahul is the Scouting Director at Antler India. At Antler, he leads the process of identifying the most driven founders looking to build iconic companies. He has been an early stage operator, founder and angel investor in the Indian startup ecosystem, and has backed the founders of Pixxel, FamPay and Homingos. Rahul is an alumnus of BITS Pilani & The Indian Military Academy.

Nitin brings over a decade of experience in global venture capital, having invested in 60+ tech startups in multiple geographies. As the founder of FirstPrinciples.VC, he built a thesis-driven syndicate and portfolio of 35+ startups backed by marquee investors, and also played a leading role in fostering India’s blockchain ecosystem. Previously, Nitin was a founding team principal at Lightbox Ventures, one of India’s leading consumer-focused VCs (now $400M under management), where he supported the first two funds since inception.

Neha is the Marketing Analyst at Antler India. Previously, she was a part of the founding team at leap.club, a community-led professional network for women where she worked on marketing and engagement.

Nandini is the Program Director at Antler India. She was previously the founder of GIGI Benefits (YC’20). Prior to her founder stint, she architected and led customer experience for Urban Ladder, India’s leading Furniture e-commerce startup. She holds a Masters Degree in Linguistics from English and Foreign Languages University, Hyderabad, India and New Media Management from Syracuse University, NY.

Lakshmikant is the Head of Finance & Legal at Antler India. Lakshmikant has more than 19 years of experience in PE & VC Fund Management, NBFC Operations, and Banking Operations. Prior to joining Antler, Lakshmikant was a Consultant to T-Hub, a Startup accelerator based in Hyderabad, and helped their startups raise capital from Angels and VC investors. Prior to his role as a Consultant, he was the Finance Controller at SRI Capital, a US-based tech VC Fund where he set up their India operations and represented the fund on the board of portfolio companies. Before that, Lakshmikant spent 10 years at Caspian Impact Investments where he was the Chief Financial Officer. Prior to Caspian, Lakshmikant worked with Cognizant Technology Solutions and Citigroup. Lakshmikant holds an MBA from Great Lakes Institute of Management, Chennai.

Karan is the Program Associate for the Antler India cohorts and plays an active role in enabling partnerships for our global portfolio. Prior to joining Antler, he worked across business development and community management across SaaS and cloud verticals. He holds a Bachelor’s degree from BMS College of Engineering.

Ishavasyam Dash is the Marketing Director at Antler India. Previously, Isha was a part of the leadership team at Unacademy, where she helped launch and grow a new skill-based course platform. She also led brand marketing for Urban Ladder, helping it become one of India's most loved brands. Prior, she was at Dulux (AkzoNobel), where she launched the specialist paints category in India. Isha holds a Master's Degree in Marketing from NMIMS, Mumbai.

Cathy Guo is a Portfolio and Investment Manager at Antler India. Previously, Cathy was the CEO and Co-Founder of Dunya Labs, building developer tools for decentralized applications. She was also a founding team member at True Beacon, a new-age asset management company formed by the founders of Zerodha, and led early-stage venture investments in companies such as Clinikk and Stayqrious at First Principles, an early-stage seed fund in Bangalore. Cathy has a degree in Economics and Philosophy from Columbia University. She is the co-author of Myth of the Entrepreneur, a book on social entrepreneurship published by Harper Collins India.