Rajinder

Balaraman

MANAGING DIRECTOR

Focus areas

Auto/Electric Vehicle

B2B/Logistics

Moving back to India in 2012 just as India's 3G rollout was taking shape, Rajinder gained a ringside view into India's digital transformation by working with the founders of some of India's biggest unicorns today. The grit, ambition and innovation shown by these founders inspires him and he is humbled by the opportunity he has had to influence their journey. Of all the things, the relationships he has been able to build across the industry are what he values the most and he hopes to access this network and learnings across businesses to help founders build successful companies

Journey

Rajinder is not your conventional IIT+IIM VC. He grew up all over the country and didn't know what he wanted to be when he grew up. His love for economics, drew him to Loyola College where he graduated at the top of his class. That opened up doors and he was soon a management trainee at Hindustan Unilever (HUL) where he worked across business functions including sales and marketing, finance, production and corporate planning.

He then moved to the US to earn his Masters in Business Administration at Harvard Business School where he truly discovered tech. The global financial crisis in 2008 co-incided with Facebook and Smartphones taking off and all he did at business school was dig around the Boston tech and VC ecosystem trying to learn as much as he could. Post business school he worked with Booz & Co. in the U.S to round out his toolkit before coming back to India where he hoped to work with founders looking to reshape India.

In his free time, Rajinder enjoys playing football and watching his team (Real Madrid). He cooks and plays music when he isn't reading or spending time with friends and family.