South Park Commons enters India, its first international location outside US

(From left) Aditya Agarwal, Ruchi Sanghvi and Binny Bansal of South Park Commons.

South Park Commons (SPC), a tech startup community and an early-stage venture fund named after San Francisco’s South Park community, has arrived in Bengaluru, its first international location outside the United States.

Started by husband-wife duo of Aditya Agarwal and Ruchi Sanghvi, SPC entered India in partnership with Flipkart co-founder Binny Bansal, the company said in a media release on June 13.

The entry comes at a time when venture funds are sitting on at least $12 billion in capital waiting to be deployed in India, the world’s third-largest startup ecosystem.

With over 820 million internet users and more than 100 tech unicorns, India has solidified its position as a global tech powerhouse, which explains SPC’s interest in India.

SPC will provide a supportive environment for India's most talented founders, technologists, and researchers to navigate the -1 to 0 stage of their careers, the stage when their primary task is figuring out what to work on next. It is similar to startup incubators, which help nurture and scale businesses.

South Park Commons started as an ad-hoc community and did not have a fund during its initial days. Agarwal and Sanghvi wrote angel cheques before setting up a dedicated capital pool, a venture fund. It launched its first fund in 2018 and another one in 2020.

Founded in 2015 by Sanghvi, the first female engineer at Facebook and former vice president of operations at Dropbox, and Agarwal, former chief technical officer of Dropbox, SPC has become a destination for technical founders seeking support in the earliest stages of their startup journey.

Apart from India, SPC also has seen a lot of interest from founders based in the United Kingdom, Agarwal told media on June 13.

"You can feel the tailwinds here. The Indian startup ecosystem has matured to the point that it can sustain the incredible talent density that makes SPC work. Founders don't have to move to the US to build world-class, category-creating companies," Agarwal said.

SPC has 150 companies started up from its community members. The companies have in total raised over $1.5 billion and are cumulatively valued at over $40 billion.