Great news for Indian entrepreneurs!
Nagavara Ramarao Narayana Murthy, better known as N. R. Narayana Murthy and one of the seven founders of Infosys Technologies – a giant of a consulting and IT services company based in India with over 100,000 employees and offices around the globe – is turning to “the dark side” after selling a bundle of company shares in order to set up a venture capital firm.
To set up the fund, the man reportedly sold 800,000 shares, or 0.13% of the company, its total value converting to $38.7 million, more or less.
According to many reports of Indian business and technology publications, Murthy aims to invest mainly in ‘brilliant’ Indian entrepreneurs who found startups that operate in the areas of healthcare, education and nutrition. Considering his background as a technology entrepreneur, I imagine some of the investments will be in technology or Internet companies as well, however. Infosys in a statement said overseas investments will also be consider on a “case-to-case basis”.
Murthy started Infosys with six others back in 1981 by borrowing INR 10,000 (roughly $215 today) from his wife Sudha Murthy, and both still hold a significant part of the company today through a family holding. Infosys went public 12 years after its original founding and its share increased three thousandfold over the next 15 years or so.
While the venture fund may seem small in size to most of our readers, $38 million can go a long way in India, so this is great news for local entrepreneurs and the ecosystem as a whole.
(Thanks for the tip, Jason)
This indeed is great news.
How do we get in touch with Mr. Murthy? I have many ideas to share with him.
Good for him, and those who will benefit from this!
Hicccccup !
This is great news.
Congratulations to Mr NRN Murthy. I got to know mr Murthy in the mid 90’s — He’s an gentleman whom I greatly admire – and one we can all set as an example.
Well he is the most respected man in Indian IT industry and I am sure he will make a difference in startup culture here. $38m for India will be same as $380m for US so I would consider it as a considerable fund.
Thanks to him.. for this socioeconomic interest..
If readers are wondering why “nutrition” was added to the list, checkout this other “venture” that Murthy is involved in: http://www.akshayapatra.org/
These guys are applying hi-technology and business metrics based approaches to feed 1 million (yeah — that’s 1 MILLION) hungry kids DAILY in India.
Good use of money by Murthy. He had been in US for most of time in last couple of years and realized that someone needs to take the lead in innovation in India. Plain talk would not help.
there we go….now its a countdown from here
Adnaan Badr you are stupid nothing you say in techcrunch make any sense you should be shame for calling yourself Indian you the kind of gai you talk too much but you don’t say nothing.
“but you don’t say nothing.”
Yeah..that says everything..
Infosys is a disaster of a company, and I’d stay away from anything that this guy touches.
ignorant fools like you should stay away from everything anyway…
I hope his fund will invest in product based companies and not the low cost labor arbitrage model that Infosys pioneered.
I appreciate Mr. Murty’s efforts… I always hoped he would take this step someday.. anyways, I strongly feel… a part of this investment should go into farming… Mr. Murthy should try get technology into farming, try produce more in less time, with less labor and no waste.
Murthy started Infosys with six others back in 1981 by borrowing INR 10,000 (roughly $215 today)
This implies you did some sort of inflation adjustment, when you really just mean you are using today’s exchange rate for INR/USD. This is highly misleading.
It is too small an amount to bother. The idea is that he started his company with very little.
My cousin Jahiti started a company with only the equivalent of three dozen cow eggs and today it worth 18 Billion USD !!!!!
Do cow eggs have shells?
Murthy’s investment plans are commendable. I’ve worked with consultants from Infosys and have this question – Why are technical people from India evil towards African-American women in technology?
>Kel_C: Why are technical people from India evil towards African-American women in technology?
Its a cultural problem here. Sad to say we spend more time finding fault with others who we perceive racism from (ie: Australians towards Indian students) than examining our own behavior. Whitening creams are still the rage. Still not enough is being done in the community to raise racial tolerance, but I do sense a change in attitudes amongst younger Indians.
“but I do sense a change in attitudes amongst younger Indians.” – this is encouraging.
Thanks and peace.
Great to see Murthy doing for the startup community other than his social philanthropic efforts.
Remember, Infosys has good products one of them being Financle – The Core Banking product and I believe they still have other good products which are not much visible to the outside world of consultancy and services.
Best of Luck to him….
Man…. Good luck to him and I want a little from that 38 millions…
Hats off to N.R.Murthy’s Initiative !
I have no doubt that he will turn this $38 million to $38000 millions (as a whole).
Considering, he turned his initial $215 into
$38 million
Interesting one! Maybe he’ll fund some of his ex-infosys-managers-turned-entrepreneurs!
He has really turned into the dark side by selling his stake as per 7 years after.
how to contact vc firm !!!, im having project.