Bala C Deshpande
Founder Partner
Bala has nearly two decades of experience in investment advisory, having started her investing career with ICICI Venture in 2001. In 2008 she joined NEA to set up their India platform where she headed the practice for 10 years and helped NEA US in investing and backing disruptive companies in the mid-market space. Prior to her investing experience, Bala had deep operational experience having worked for about 10 years with well-regarded multi-national corporations in India such as ICI, Cadbury’s and BestFoods.
Her investment advisory career spans both early stage and growth investing experience across multiple sectors. She has played an instrumental role in many innovative plays and entrepreneurial journeys including the first Internet IPO, first 24-hour news channel, first Payments Tech company, several consumer companies that redefined the sector etc. She is an Independent Board member of two deeply disruptive companies viz. Info Edge Ltd and Future Enterprise Limited. During her Board Tenure these companies have grown exponentially, emerged as category leaders and created immense shareholder value with multi-billion-dollar market caps.