DECEMBER 7: The India-born founders of Exodus Communications, a success story in the US, are investing in India in a big way. Exodus co-founder B V Jagadeesh has identified four Indian companies in which both he and his partner K B Chandrasekhar are likely invest. Two of them are in the area of IT infrastructure and the other two are in e-commerce and portals. The purpose of the investment will be to guide or mentor the companies and also help in networking with the right people.Exodus, an over $10 billion (around Rs 43,450 crore) company carries about 40 per cent of the world's internet traffic on its data centres. This five-year old company had a phenomenal rise and once it was on the verge of closure before the founders met Kanwal Rekhi in 1996. "It is our way of paying back," Jagadeesh, who was here for the inauguaration of the Mumbai chapter of the Thus IndUS Entrepreneurs (TiE), a non-profit organisation to help next generation entrepreneus, told The Indian Express. The investment decision isexpected to be taken within two or three months.Chandrasekhar and Jagadeesh are already mentoring Bangalore-based Graycell and have made a personal investment in the firm. Graycell promoted by T S Rajesh Reddy makes Unimobile, a software which enables users to send e-mail to cell phones. Chandrasekhar has also invested in another Bangalore firm, Azetc Software. The new investments by the Exodus founders will also be in their personal capacity.Jagadeesh declined to name the companies or reveal the proposed investment. "It is not about money. It is more about bringing value to the company," he said. He said the partners were also putting money in a couple of venture capital funds in India with the aim of getting them to invest at least 25 to 30 per cent in high-risk projects.The launch of TiE Mumbai chapter also attracted other Silicon Valley luminaries like Suhas Patil, chairman emeritus of Cirrus Logic and first president of TiE, Kanwal Rekhi, and Torrent Technologies founder Hemant Kanakia. TheBangalore chapter of TiE was launched on Monday and the Delhi chapter is to be launched on Wednesday.Harish Mehta of Onward Novell will be president of the Mumbai chapter. Apart from Mehta, others who have committed to mentor entrepreneurs here include Vijay Mukhi and Ashank Desai.Torrent founder in new start-upMUMBAI: Hemant Kanakia, founder of Torrent Networking Technologies, said he would be resigning from Ericsson in January to found another start-up venture. Torrent was acquired by Ericsson for $ 450 million. The new venture, called Pata Optics, has already been formed. "It was formed just a day before I left for India," Kanakia revealed. Kanakia, an alumni of IIT Bombay, worked at AT&T Labs for six years before founding his first start-up in 1996. Pata will have four founding members including Kanakia - two of them formerly with Bell Labs. Pata will work in the area of optics and routers.
