The fund, which completed its first year of operations in India on February 20, has already invested $15 million in eight companies within the first twelve month period. Out of this, $ 7 million has been invested in three US-based infotech companies promoted by Indians. These companies operates in the area of enterprise resource planning (ERP), E-commerce and internet related businesses.

TCW/ICICI fund is a seven year close-end fund for making private equity investments. The fund has a committed capital of $ 51 million from a number of foreign institutional investors like the Australian Mutual Provident Society, International Finance Corporation, Kuwait Investment Authority, Kuwait Financial Centre, Singapore Technologies, Sun America and Dresdner KleinworthBenson Ltd. ICICI Venture plans to invest the entire committed funds this year itself.

The fund has primarily invested in unlisted equity issued by medium sized companies in a broad range of industries where Indian economy has a distinctive competetive advantages. ``The investments made till date are largely in knowledge-based businesses like information technology, pharmaceuticals and services,'' said AJV Jayachander, president, ICICI Venture Funds.

``ICICI Venture has a strong deal-flowgiven its relationships with Indian corporates and merchant intermediaries. In future ICICI Venture will aggressively seek investments in these areas with special focus on a global marketing strategy,'' he said.

ICICI Venture is also becomming aggressive in sourcing overseas investments in sectors where Indians have a competetive advantage like in IT and Healthcare.

``Liberalisation and the growth in India's telecommunication and software sectors have led to new business opportunities in the global marketplace. Inorder to capitalise on such opportunities, ICICI Venture has followed an aggressive investment strategy for investments globally and specially in the US. These are primarily in the software and healthcare sectors, where a strong Indian connection is a successful business model. During the last year, the fund has invested over $ 7 million in overseas ventures. We plan to pursue an aggressive cross border investment strategy to capitalise on these emerging opportunities,'' said Jayachander.

ICICI Venture has also decided to focus on funding acquisition of brands and companies. ``Focus on core competence and consolidation of businesses, which is becoming a critical success factor, has led to acquisition of brands and companies. Over the last year, ICICI Venture has evaluated many such proposals and concluded an investment in a multi-vendor company based at Chennai,'' he said.

ICICI Venture is currently holding its annual investors conference in Bangalore. The objective of the conference is to ally theconcerns of international investors on the state of the economy and capital markets and also reinforce the image of India being an emerging economic power.