Spearheaded by three former Goldman Sachs employees Mr Sumir Chadha, Mr KP Balaraj and Mr Raj Dugar, WestBridge Capital focuses on early stage cross-border business. Mr Sumir Chadha, Managing Director, WestBridge Capital says: "We will be aiding Indian entrepreneurs who want to build a global business with a special emphasis on the US market, and focussing on the IT and IT-enabled sectors. And more specifically, we are looking at breakthrough technology, wireless space, networking, chip design, and in traditional success models focussing on high-end software services or IT-enabled services."

WestBridge Capital will seek to make early investments in start-ups, mostly at a stage where companies are seeking venture capital post an initial seed or angel round. They will also selectively make later-stage investments in companies prior to the IPO stage and help them manage their IPOs. WestBridge is backed by international and individual entrepreneurs such as Mr Arjun Malhotra of HCL/TechSpan, Mr Suhas Patil (founder of Cirrus Logic), Mr Shailesh Mehta of Providian, Mr BV Jagadeesh (co-founder of Exodus), Mr Aditya Mittal of Ispat, Mr R Ramraj of Satyam Infoway, Mr Ajit Balakrishnan of Rediff and Mr Sat Pal Khattar of Khattar Wong-all of whom serve on the advisory board. In addition to the cornerstone investors - Goldman Sachs, SUN Technology, Capital Z Investments - investors in the fund include blue-chip firms like Merril Lynch.