Healthcare-focused venture capital firm W Health Ventures is raising its second fund with a target corpus of $70 million (Rs 600 crore) and a hard cap of $100 million (Rs 850 crore), doubling down on its “company creation” model to build healthcare businesses from the ground. The firm expects to announce its first close in the coming week.
Founded in 2021 with a single-LP fund of around $50 million, W Health has co-built healthcare ventures, rather than backing early-stage startups in a traditional sense. These include Nivaan (chronic pain), Mylo (parenting), BeatO (diabetes), and BabyMD (paediatrics) in India, along with cross-border companies like Wysa (AI mental health services) and Reveal HealthTech (AI transformation services).
Fund II, structured as a multi-LP fund, will continue to focus on both the Indian market and cross-border opportunities in the US-India corridor, said Pankaj Jethwani, Managing Partner at W Health Ventures.
Fund plans
The fund plans to build 8 to 10 new companies over the next four years, focused on the two proven themes from Fund I. The first is single-specialty care delivery platforms that fill critical clinical ‘white spaces’ in India, and the second is AI-enabled B2B healthcare services companies that support US-based healthcare firms.
“This strategy has resonated with LPs who are operators and promoters in healthcare companies, especially from India and the US,” Jethwani told FE. The firm will typically invest $10 million per company across tranches, with initial cheques of $4–5 million. It has already made two investments from the second fund, including Everhope Oncology, a joint venture with Narayana Health to deliver outpatient cancer care across India.
Jethwani emphasizes that W Health is a healthcare, not healthtech, investor. “Technology and AI are core enablers, but not all problems can be solved digitally. For instance, cancer care and chronic pain need integrated offline models.”
The firm is betting on India’s healthcare consumption
With plans to announce four senior appointments soon, the firm is betting big on India’s increasing healthcare consumption. Jethwani noted that 5-10 years ago, India was spending just $70 per person annually on healthcare, a fraction the US spends. However, since the pandemic, that number has been rising rapidly at a rate of 15–20% year on year. Overall healthcare spending in India still stands at a relatively modest $300 billion for a population of 1.5 billion.
“This increase in consumption is driving growth in hospital and pharma stocks and is expected to continue steadily for the next two decades. It’s not a short-term trend or market cycle. One in every four private equity deals in India today is in healthcare, pharma, or biotech,” Jethwani said.
