Homegrown venture debt fund Stride Ventures is raising three parallel funds across India, the GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council), and the UK, with a combined target of $600 million, of which half has already been raised. The move signals a shift from venture debt as a regional credit product to being used as a cross-border financing tool, particularly as founders increasingly expand beyond a single geography, explains Managing Partner Apoorva Sharma, in an interview with Ayanti Bera. Excerpts:
Stride just announced a $600 million raise. Is this one large fund or multiple funds?
These are three separate funds across three geographies — India (Stride India Fund IV), the GCC, and the UK — adding up to a cumulative corpus of $600 million. We’ve already raised $300 million of that in the last six months and aim to close the rest by March. Structurally, all three funds are independent and regulated separately.
Why did you announce them together if they’re all independent?
Because we’re raising them in parallel, the cumulative announcement reflects the direction of the firm. Until now, venture debt has been a regional product, but startups are increasingly building for multiple geographies, and there is no credit provider today that can support a founder’s credit journey across multiple markets. We want to be that partner.
What makes the GCC exciting for venture debt opportunities?
GCC credit market is at a real inflection point. Because of Sharia compliance, charging interest is prohibited, which has historically limited the growth of conventional debt products. But credit structures have evolved significantly since then. Today, the region has strong policy support, governments are diversifying away from oil, there is zero personal income tax, it’s attracting the right talent, and there is a big demand for credit, but few players to serve that.
And what’s the white space in the UK market?
The UK has plenty of lenders, but most operate in the $15-20 million cheque range. Very few will write sub-$10 million or sub-$15 million cheques. That’s a gap we want to fill.
Coming back to India, are there enough sponsor-backed startups for this fund to deploy into?
Of course. Our fund sizes have typically been $200-250 million, and at that size, there are enough venture-backed and private-equity-backed companies that require debt. India has had a good IPO window in the last 12-18 months, and pre-IPO is a very attractive time to deploy because companies shore up their balance sheet before filing their DRHP.
Who are your limited partners (LP) this time? More foreign participation?
The GCC fund is entirely backed by GCC sovereigns. The UK fund has LPs from the UK and Europe. India Fund IV still has largely domestic LPs, but more institutional foreign capital has also come in. Earlier funds were mostly domestic because foreign institutions don’t write small cheques, so they need the fund size to be large enough. Now with larger fund sizes and a six-year track record, we are better suited.
Has the cheque size changed with the larger fund?
Definitely. In our first fund, a typical cheque was $2-3 million. Today, the average is $4-5 million, but we can stretch to $15 million when necessary. That puts us in overlap with private credit deals. We already participate in these deals alongside large private credit funds.
What’s your early-stage versus late-stage split now?
Early-stage cheques help us build a relationship with the company early. Once companies scale, we are already a known partner. But 80% of our actual deployment, by quantum, is growth and late-stage.
How do you balance warrant upside versus debt returns?
At the early stage, warrant upside can be significant. In late-stage or pre-IPO, multiple reasons can reduce warrant upside, so we increase the debt IRR (internal rate of return). The mix changes, but the outcome we target remains the same, that is, over 20% gross return and about 17%+ net return to our LPs.
