This quarter took us from global stages in Singapore to homegrown innovation hubs across India. In this edition, we share reflections from key industry events, insights from evolving market landscapes, and moments that reinforced our belief: exceptional returns emerge from genuine value creation, and great companies are built through a mature ecosystem and patient capital.
SuperReturn Asia 2025: India Takes Centre stage
YourNest’s Sunil Goyal, Managing Director & Fund Manager, and Sanchit Taneja, VP – Fundraise & Investor Relations, returned from an energising week at SuperReturn Asia 2025 in Singapore, the premier gathering for private capital leaders. Amidst a confluence of global LPs, GPs and innovators, Sunil took the stage to deliver a session on ‘Metrics that move the needle: exits, liquidity, and DPI’; though the session’s title centred on returns, the substance of his talk struck a chord with YourNest’s Nurture Capital philosophy, highlighting how genuine value creation ultimately drives meaningful outcomes. For YourNest, the conversation has always been about more than just deploying capital—it’s about creating tangible pathways to liquidity and generating world-class returns. YourNest’s track record of 10 successful exits over the past five years is a testament to this unwavering focus.
A powerful and recurring theme throughout the event was the India Opportunity. The global narrative has clearly matured. Discussions have moved beyond mere potential and are now firmly centred on the country’s proven resilience, scale, and the immense depth of its entrepreneurial and technological talent.
IVCA DeepTech Roundtable: Catalysing India’s Innovation Infrastructure
This September, Sunil Goyal participated in a roundtable on India’s DeepTech ecosystem. The gathering brought together fund managers, policy architects, and industry leaders, and what unfolded was a conversation that went far beyond typical investment discussions. The room grappled with a fundamental question- Are we building at the core or the peripheries?
Whilst India has made impressive strides in areas like drones and space technology, the dialogue challenged everyone present to think bigger, to map capability gaps across sectors, from semiconductors for EVs to the 25,000 components that make up jet engines. What struck him the most was the emerging consensus: capital alone won’t accelerate DeepTech. The ecosystem needs patient capital structures like continuation vehicles, streamlined regulatory pathways, and crucially, stronger connections between builders and buyers. The discussion around IN-SPACe’s success was particularly inspiring, facilitating over 100 technology transfers and enabling India’s first sovereign satellite consortium through an innovative PPP model. It offered a compelling template for what’s possible. For YourNest, the roundtable reinforced something we’ve always believed: DeepTech’s long gestation periods aren’t insurmountable when you combine strategic capital deployment with genuine ecosystem building. The real opportunity lies not just in funding innovation, but in creating the infrastructure that allows breakthrough technologies to scale from pilot to sustainable operations.
India’s Impressive Secondary Market Evolution
At the IVCA Secondaries Conference in Mumbai, Shaifali Kapoor, Associate Principal – Investment Management from YourNest witnessed something unexpected. Walking in, she had anticipated the usual international players dominating discussions about India’s evolving secondary landscape. Instead, the room buzzed with India-focused players like Kenro Capital, Foundation’s Private Equity, Neo Asset Management, and others – signalling a fundamental shift in the ecosystem.
Speaking with Dominic Goh, Managing Director (HarbourVest Partners), Rohit Aggarwal, Senior Vice President – Head of Asian PE (Aksia), Swaroop Gudla, Principal (Headlands Capital), Alok Gupta, Partner – Head of India (Foundation Private Equity), Rohit Bhayana, Co-Founder (Oister Global), William Lo, Principal (Hamilton Lane), and representatives from HDFC Asset Management Company, the picture became clear: India’s secondary market has finally come full circle. Funds raised in 2010 are now facing exit pressures, creating urgent demand for liquidity.
Sunil Goyal participated in a panel discussion on ‘Continuation Funds: Unlocking Liquidity and Delivering Value’. The session brought together leading industry voices to discuss the evolving landscape of continuation vehicles and their growing role in providing liquidity and value creation opportunities. Joining him on the panel were Jason Sambanju, Co-Founder and Partner (Foundation Private Equity), Chee Mun Cheng, Managing Director (57 Stars), William Lo, Principal, Private Equity Secondaries (Hamilton Lane) and Mamtesh Sugla, Managing Director (TPG NewQuest).
What is striking is the understanding why these funds have become so valuable now. GPs face immense pressure to deliver DPI to raise their next rounds—they need to return capital. Secondary transactions offer an elegant solution. Meanwhile, many LPs still see significant value creation ahead and want the option to hold, creating a natural market.
The conversations challenged assumptions, too. These secondary players aren’t chasing any deal—they are laser-focused on assets with near-term, well-defined exits. They want sustainable, scaled, substantially de-risked businesses that still offer 3-5x returns. This is a fine balance, and they are disciplined about it.
For us at YourNest, being part of the conversation while raising our YourNest Jumpstart Fund was invaluable. Understanding this evolving secondary landscape isn’t just helpful for our portfolio’s exit strategies—it’s essential.
Building Beyond Boardrooms: Portfolio Mixer
Mid-October evening at Soi 7 in Cyberhub, Gurugram, YourNest hosted the Delhi NCR Portfolio Mixer—an evening that brought together our portfolio founders, investors, peer VCs and ecosystem partners under one roof.
The event centred around creating genuine connections within the community. Portfolio founders had the opportunity to engage with investors, VCs exchanged insights and experiences and, throughout the evening, new partnerships began to take shape organically. This was nurture capital in practice—founders who are typically immersed in building their ventures had the chance to step back, connect with peers, and realise the strength of the community around them.
These mixers embody what YourNest believes: that great companies are not built with capital alone, but with mentorship, community, and a genuine commitment to creating value beyond balance sheets. They are spaces where meaningful conversations happen naturally—over shared experiences and mutual understanding.
YourNest expressed gratitude to every founder who attended and shared their journey, every investor who contributed their perspective, and everyone who showed up with curiosity and openness.
Tamil Nadu Global Startup Summit: Where Vision Meets Opportunity
This October, Bhargavi Mantri, Analyst – Deal Cultivation & Investment represented YourNest at the Tamil Nadu Global Startup Summit 2025 in Coimbatore—an event that exceeded every expectation. Her initial goal was straightforward: connect with as many DeepTech founders as possible and expand YourNest’s dealflow. What she experienced went far beyond that.
The summit brought together some of the most dynamic minds in India’s startup ecosystem—early-stage founders, ecosystem enablers, global investors, and policymakers. The scale was impressive: over 72,000 visitors, participants from 45 countries, more than 750 exhibition stalls, and 115+ investors engaged in dialogue over two days.
The atmosphere buzzed with energy. Passionate founders, innovators, and ecosystem partners were united by one thing: the desire to build something meaningful. Every conversation transcended business models and pitches. It centred on vision, perseverance, and the belief that innovation can emerge from anywhere.
One founder from a tier-3 town spoke about something that truly resonated with our thesis: “Opportunities like this make us believe that where we come from doesn’t define what we can create.” That single statement captured the summit’s spirit perfectly, bold dreams backed by resilience, and deep conviction that great ideas don’t have a postcode.
Bhargavi also had the impromptu opportunity to represent YourNest on a panel discussion. It led to several LPs reaching out afterwards, expressing genuine interest in YourNest, and was a gratifying reminder of how meaningful connections often emerge when least anticipated.
Coimbatore was deeply inspiring, not just by the startups, but by the collective drive shaping India’s innovation story. For YourNest, events like these reinforce why we are committed to empowering ideas from every corner of the country.
Emerging Science, Technology and Innovation, Conclave: The Exciting Future of DeepTech
On November 4th, at the Emerging Science, Technology and Innovation, Conclave 2025 in New Delhi, Sunil Goyal participated in a panel tasked with an exciting challenge – narrowing down India’s most promising DeepTech startups from 15 companies that represent not just innovation, but conviction. His co-panelists included Prasad Menon, Rajan Anandan, Kunal Upadhyay, Varun Aggarwal, Ajay Jain Forums such as these reinstate our belief in Indian DeepTech founders. ESTIC isn’t your typical startup showcase – it’s where Nobel Laureates share the stage with first-time founders, policymakers meet product builders and where the promise of Viksit Bharat 2047 becomes tangible in the form of quantum computing breakthroughs, bio-manufacturing innovations, and semiconductor solutions being developed not in some distant lab, but right here by people who believed it was possible. Eventually, the top five startups that emerged were FORTYTWO LABS, Lifespark Technologies, Noccarc, Atreya Innovations Private Limited, EndureAir Systems Pvt. Ltd. It was good to see the energy and enthusiasm brought by not only the startups who won but also the ones who presented. The future they are building is one we’re proud and excited to be part of.
IIT Madras: Nurture Capital in Practice
In November Venkat S. Raju Venture Partner at YourNest attended a deep-dive talk at IIT Madras hosted by IIT Madras Incubation Cell. The engagement brought together promising startups building at the intersection of hardware, software, and emerging technologies. He had the pleasure of interacting with the founders of AstraYAN, an Indian DeepTech startup pioneering intelligent systems for the next generation of marine and naval platforms, UniteHub who are building a unified blockchain-based intelligence network designed to monitor online cash transactions in real time and Daloft Aerospace Private Limited which is charting India’s path in aerospace innovation.
Rich, constructive conversations unfolded between Venkat and the founders which hopefully equipped the founders with the insights needed to refine their direction, solidify product-market fit, and scale with purpose. This is what YourNest believes in, our nurture capital ideology restricted not just to our portfolio companies but for founders with an idea and the determination to materialise it