IFC may invest in education-focused PE Firm Kaizen

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Education-focused private equity firm Kaizen is raising commitment for its debut fund from International Financial Corporation (IFC), the private investment arm of World Bank. The Mumbai-based firm is targeting $80 million for the fund, with its size capped at $100 million. Kaizen is headed by Sandeep Aneja, founder and managing director of the firm, who was earlier with Milestone Capital.

Kaizen is the first PE firm in India exclusively dedicated to the education sector, which has been attracting a lot of interest from investors.

Kaizen's fund expects to raise over 50% of the fund from institutional investors. The PE fund will look at providing funding to education companies in their growth stage and will also focus on operational improvements in its portfolio companies. The fund would look at typically investing in the range of $5 million to $15 million, according to its website.

The investment manager to the fund is Monterey Capital Management and investment advisors are Kaizen Management Advisory Private Limited. Other team members of Kaizen are Jetu Lalvani, Amit Ratanpal, Monica Mehta, and Akhil Shahani.

Barely days back, the sector saw possibly the biggest cross-border inbound acquisition with British media group Pearson Plc acquiring a majority stake in education-cum-consumer internet services firm TutorVista, valuing it at  $214 million. The deal saw TutorVista's venture capital    investors like Sequoia Capital make good returns, which will further increase the limited partners interest in the space.

Education sector has seen investments of $190 million across 23 deals in the calendar year 2010, according to VCCEdge. This compared to 10 deals worth $128 million in the entire calendar year 2009. Beginning of 2011 has already seen several deals which include New Silk Route's   investment in Hyderabad's Shri Chaitanya and Dubai-based QInvest's deal with FIITJEE.

By: Madhav Chanchani