Bio

Venkat is a co-founder of Veda and has 25 years of hands-on experience in the investment banking business. A pioneer in the investment banking space in India, he has been closely associated with the growth of the Indian VC/PE industry since the mid-90s. He has an enviable track record of transaction closures in Private Equity as well as M&A, having crafted several defining transactions across domains such as Services, Infrastructure and ITeS, amongst others. Venkat is a successful entrepreneur, having co-founded Mantra Consultants in 1998, a boutique investment bank based in South India, which was subsequently acquired by Ernst & Young in 2001. He was an Associate Director at Ernst & Young before co-founding Veda in late 2003. Venkat is an Associate Member of the Institute of Company Secretaries of India. He is a regular speaker in industry forums and his views on are often quoted in the business media. Venkat is a voracious reader of cricketing prose, connoisseur of test match cricket, has dabbled with cricket writing and commentating in early days, keen interest in politics and current affairs, cat lover, horse racing enthusiast and unfulfilled ambitions include penning a movie script and leading home a derby winner.