Venture Highway partners with General Catalyst to support the growth of Indian startups.

New Delhi-based Venture Highway has announced its merger with Silicon Valley venture capital firm General Catalyst. The partnership aims to invest between $500 million and $1 billion in India to bolster General Catalyst's presence in the country. As a result of the merger, Venture Highway will be rebranded as Venture Catalyst India, continuing its operations and investments under the new name. Neeraj Arora, the founder of Venture Highway and former WhatsApp CBO, along with Priya Mohan, its General Partner, will lead the efforts in India.

Founded in 2014, Venture Highway has been a significant early-stage investor in several successful Indian startups, such as the social commerce platform Meesho and the B2B marketplace Moglix. All of Venture Highway's portfolio companies will be managed as before, though now under the General Catalyst brand. The combined entity will review Venture Highway's existing portfolio for potential follow-on investments. With most of the funds from Venture Highway's third fund already deployed, additional investments will be made using General Catalyst's resources.

Over the next three years, General Catalyst, which manages over $25 billion in assets globally, plans to invest $500 million to $1 billion in Indian startups. These investments will target both early and growth stages across various sectors. Hemant Taneja, CEO of General Catalyst, expressed enthusiasm about the merger, saying, "By integrating our US seed team with Venture Highway in India and La Famiglia in Europe, we are deeply committed to excelling at supporting the world’s top startups from the earliest stages. The combined strengths of the two firms will enable us to be more hands-on and effective in India. I'm particularly excited about introducing our co-creation capabilities to India."

General Catalyst echoed this sentiment in a blog post, stating, "We are thrilled to announce that Venture Highway (VH) is merging with General Catalyst (GC) to spearhead GC’s initiatives in India and create one of the most powerful venture platforms to support the next generation of entrepreneurs in India."