Dhawan: New interest

New Delhi, March 5: Ashish Dhawan, the founder of ChrysCapital Investment Advisors, a private equity firm, today announced his plans to quit the firm in July next year to pursue interests in education and investment potentials in the sector.

“Nothing changes until July 2012. Even thereafter, I will continue to engage with activities that pertain to any investment recommendations made till then. I plan to eventually focus my energy on not-for-profit K-12 education in India,” Dhawan said.

ChrysCapital, which manages about $2 billion through five funds, became one of the biggest funds in the country under his leadership.

The firm plans to launch its sixth round of fund raising in mid-2012 with a small corpus, Sanjiv Kaul, one of the managing directors of the firm, said. The firm had raised about $970 million in its fifth round of fund raising, he said, adding that the next round would be lower than that.

Dhawan’s move marks a significant development in the Indian private equity landscape as he is almost synonymous with the evolution of the industry in the country.

The Harvard pass-out, who set up ChrysCapital with Harvard buddy Raj Kondur in 1999, can be credited for raising the return expectations of institutional investors from an Indian private equity portfolio.

Apart from some initial members — co-founder Raj Kondur, and others like Luis Miranda and Shujaat Khan who left the firm in the early days — the senior management team has remained the same with Brahmal Vasudevan, Gulpreet Kohli, Kunal Shroff, Ashley Menezes and Sanjiv Kaul staying on for more than eight years now.

ChrysCapital’s investment and exit track record indicate that it looks beyond the obvious to take its investment bets. It invested $10 million in Gurgaon-based BPO start-up Spectramind and when Wipro bought it in 2002, it earned $60 million on the investment, according to industry estimates.