Mr. Harsh Kaul
Independent DirectorMr. Harsh Kaul (DIN 02128947), retired from SIDBI on 31 March 2015 after putting in 35 years of service in IDBI and SIDBI. He has served at Head office and has been in-charge of SIDBI Western Zonal office, SIDBI, Ahmedabad and Faridabad branches. He has also operated as Business Head for North and West India. As CEO of SIDBI Venture Capital Ltd. from 2009-11, he managed two VC funds with AUM of Rs. 600 crores. He was also the Country Head for Equity and Risk Capital Vertical, Service Sector Vertical, Infrastructure Vertical and Receivable Finance Vertical of SIDBI.
The main areas of responsibility in these Verticals was policy formulation and review of existing schemes of assistance as well as introduction of new schemes for achieving business targets of the bank. As Head of the Risk Capital Vertical, Mr. Kaul’s primary responsibility was to institutionalize non-collateral and cash flow based lending. He was responsible for the introduction of the Startup Assistance Scheme which looks at early stage companies and extends venture debt for such enterprises. Mr. Kaul has also been responsible for the development of the National Innovation Finance Programme (NIFP) which seeks to connect all the players/service providers in the early stage and startup ecosystem.
Apart from his involvement in all direct lending schemes of SIDBI, Mr. Kaul was also heading the Fund of Fund operations of the bank. SIDBI has so far contributed to the corpus of 68 venture capital funds with cumulative commitments aggregating Rs. 1600 crores. IRR in respect of some of the close funds ranged from 7.5 % to 32 %.
Mr. Kaul has also been instrumental in operating lines and credit contracted from international institutions such as KFW (a German Development Bank) and the World Bank. He is involved with a USD 500 Mn project with the World Bank, a part of which is for assisting startups and early stage enterprises as also growth stage MSMEs by way of risk capital assistance. The project aims to increase the outreach of SIDBI for assisting startups and early stage enterprises through partnerships and innovative financing models.
As Director on the Board of SVCL, Mr. Kaul has been associated with setting up of three government sponsored funds, viz., Rs. 200 crore West Bengal MSME, Venture Capital Fund, Rs. 200 crore Maharashtra State Specific Alternative Investment Fund and a small fund set up by the Ministry of Textiles, Government of India. SVCL is the Investment Manager of all the three funds.
Mr. Kaul continues as a member of the investment committees, boards and advisory boards of some Funds such as Blume Venture Fund, SEAF, Agri Business Fund, Rajasthan Venture Capital and SIDBI Venture Capital Ltd.