Investment Profile

Aspada Capital Investments

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Aspada is an $85M fund that invests in SMEs that benefit low-income people and smallholder farmers in India.
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Investment size:  $85M
Theme Small and Medium Business Development
Type Indirect
Geography Asia
Date 2013

Theory of Change

Aspada provides seed and early-stage patient capital to Indian small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in food supply chains, healthcare, education and financial services. This accessible finance helps SMEs launch, expand or modernize their operations. Aspada investees are addressing the fundamental needs of poor and low-income persons in innovative and systematic ways. Investees create jobs, deliver essential goods and services, and improve the livelihoods of people whose individual monthly income is less than Rs. 15,000, or smallholder farmers cultivating less than three acres of land. Over time, Aspada investees contribute to lowering the price of goods and services, large-scale employment and preventing community deterioration.

Challenge and Context

When SEDF created and invested in Aspada in 2013 there was an acute need to find scalable solutions to support large numbers of people to move up the economic ladder and participate in India’s formal economy. Over 150 million households were living on less than USD $8 per day, 500 million were living below the poverty line. Agriculture was the main employer with over 600 million livelihoods dependent on farming, much of which was small-scale and lacking in modern techniques.  

The burgeoning Indian Private Equity/Venture Capital industry traditionally focused on sectors such as infrastructure, capital goods and technology that have tried-and-tested analogs in developed markets. Capital directed towards business models focused on essential services and products for the underserved was relatively unavailable. Aspada responded to an opportunity for funding private enterprises that provide high quality basic services at scale to the so-called “forgotten middle”.  

Description

The Soros Economic Development Fund launched Aspada in 2013. In 2021, SEDF sold a controlling interest to Lightstone (“LGT”), the international private banking and asset management group owned by the Princely House of Liechtenstein. This positioned Aspada to transition into growth stage investing. Lightrock India manages investments of SONG (an early-stage venture capital firm backed by SEDF, Omidyar Network, and Google), LGT Impact, Aspada and Lightrock. 

Impact

Between 2013 and 2021 Aspada’s portfolio companies:  

  • provided jobs to over 900,000 people earning less than Rs 15,000 per day 
  • delivered essential goods and services to over 150,000 smallholder farmers  
  • delivered education services to over one million students  
  • attracted significant follow-on funding from impact investors, locally based private equity funds, international funds and corporate/strategic investors 

By 2023, Aspada’s portfolio companies are expected to have impacted approximately 3.7 million Target Class persons — a 35x increase from Aspada’s initial goals. 


Why SEDF?

SEDF’s investment was made to advance Open Society’s economic development support for India, particularly in agriculture, health and education.