Definitive Agreement
Near
KLUDEIN I ACQUISITION CORP
- Registration2020-12-14 Filed S1
- IPO2021-01-08 IPO, search begins
- Definitive Agreement2022-05-18 Agreement for merger
- CompletedNot yet completed
- Raised
- $150M
- CIK
- 1826671
- SPAC Ticker
- INKAU
- Merger
- Near
- Focus
- Technology, Software, Unicorns
SPAC Team
Leadership
Narayan Ramachandran, our Chairman and Chief Executive Officer , is a successful investment professional with over three decades of investment experience. Between January 2016 and December 2019, Mr. Ramachandran served as a General Partner and Vice Chairman of L Catterton Asia, a leading consumer-focused private equity firm with more than $3 billion in assets under management. Prior to that, Mr. Ramachandran co-founded InKlude Labs, a social enterprise incubator, and KludeIn Ventures, a Palo Alto-based investment firm focused on strategic investments in high growth companies, and has served as the Chairman and General Partner of KludeIn Management LLC, since June 2015. He previously served as the head of Morgan Stanley in India from July 2006 to February 2010, and also led Morgan Stanley’s Global Emerging Markets and Global Asset Allocation portfolio management teams from March 2001 to July 2006, managing over $25 billion in assets. Mr. Ramachandran received a B.S with distinction in chemical engineering from IIT Bombay, and holds an MBA from the Ross School of Business, University of Michigan. Mr. Ramachandran is a Chartered Financial Analyst.
Mini Krishnamoorthy, our Chief Financial Officer , has served as the Chief Financial Officer and the Head of Data Analytics for ZeeMee Inc., a venture-funded education technology company based in Silicon Valley, since September 2016, where she leads a team of data scientists to provide key analytics to customers. She has effectively overseen key growth initiatives at ZeeMee Inc and now works with 75 universities in the United States who use ZeeMee’s services to effectively recruit undergraduate students globally. From 2015 to 2016, Ms. Krishnamoorthy served as a senior member of the Capital Markets team of Kabbage, Inc., a financial technology company providing small business loans. From 2013 to 2015, Ms. Krishnamoorthy served as Chief of Staff for Corporate Development and Treasury at HP Inc. and was part of the strategy and planning team during HP’s restructure. Previously, she worked at Deutsche Bank as part of Global Banking and Markets Chief Operating Office team in London and started her career at Commonwealth Bank of Australia in the Structured Finance team. Ms. Krishnamoorthy received her MBA from Macquarie Graduate School of Management in Sydney, Australia, and a Bachelor’s Degree in Actuarial Studies from Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia.
Dr. Ashish Gupta, our Co-President , is a successful entrepreneur and investment professional with over 25 years of technology investment experience in the United States and in India. For the past 5 years, Dr. Gupta has been an independent business consultant through his consulting firm, GGT2 LLC. He is the co-founder of Helion Ventures, an India-focused venture capital firm with over $600 million under management. He currently serves on the board of directors of Info Edge (NSE INDIA: NAUKRI) and Hindustan Unilever (NSE INDIA: HINDUNILVR) in India. Dr. Gupta has co-founded two successful companies, Junglee (acquired by Amazon) and Tavant Technologies, and previously worked as a Kauffman Fellow at Woodside Fund from 2003 to 2004 and as an Investment Partner at Woodside Fund from 2004 to 2005. Dr. Gupta worked was a senior member of the Technical Staff at Oracle Corporation from 1995 to 1996 and as a member of the Research Staff at IBM from 1994 to 1995. Dr. Gupta received a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Stanford University and a B.S. in Computer Science from IIT Kanpur, where he was awarded the President’s Gold medal.
Sriram Raghavan, our Co-President , is a serial entrepreneur and investor in both the public and private markets. Mr. Raghavan co-founded KludeIn, an investment partnership, in 2015, and has served as a General Partner since then. From October 2018 to December 2019, he was a Partner with L Catterton Asia. Prior to that, Mr. Raghavan served on the Strategic Advisory Board of L Catterton, where he provided leadership in Consumer Technology Investing. Prior to that, Mr. Raghavan has founded, built and sold technology focused companies in the United States and India, including Comat Technologies, a social enterprise specializing in delivering of information based services to rural India, in 2011. He was also an early contributor to the design of the Aadhar system, India’s unique ID system covering over a billion residents. Mr. Raghavan received his B.S. in Electronics Engineering, and attended the Executive Program of Global Leadership and Public Policy for the 21st Century at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University in 2010. Mr. Raghavan has also received several personal accolades in recognition of his work, including being honored with the Social Innovation Park Fellow Award in 2010 as a high achieving individual creating systemic social change and the Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum for 2010.
Arjun Divecha, who will serve as a Special Advisor to the Company following the effective date of this registration statement, is a Portfolio Manager Grantham Mayo Van Otterloo (GMO), a Boston-based investment management firm. Mr. Divecha joined GMO in 1993 and is responsible for the firm’s emerging equity funds. He has served on GMO’s Board of Directors for the past 20 years, and has served as Chairman for the past 10 years. From 1981 to 1993, Mr. Divecha worked at BARRA (a Berkeley-based fintech SAAS firm, which was acquired by MSCI in 2004), directing software development, marketing, client service and emerging markets research and development. He is the Founder-Director of The Divecha Centre for Climate Change at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, and a board member of the Bay Area chapter of Pratham. Mr. Divecha received a B.S. in Aeronautical Engineering from IIT Bombay and holds an MBA from Cornell University.
Krishnan Rajagopalan will serve as a director upon the effectiveness of the registration statement to which this prospectus forms a part. Mr. Rajagopalan has over 18 years of experience in executive search, having led C-suite and Board level searches for global corporations across all industries, including technology, consumer markets, healthcare, financial services and private equity. Since July 2017, Mr. Rajagopalan has been serving as the President and Chief Executive Officer for Heidrick & Struggles International, Inc., a global leadership advisory firm providing executive search, leadership assessment and development, organization and team effectiveness, and culture shaping services. He also serves on the Board of Directors of Heidrick & Struggles and leads the firm’s global Management Committee since July 2017, and served as acting President and CEO and interim Principal Executive Officer from April to July 2017. Mr. Rajagopalan formerly led Heidrick & Struggles’ Global Executive Search business unit from January 2015 to July 2017, and also led the firm’s Global Technology & Services practice from 2007 to 2015. Prior to joining Heidrick & Struggles, Mr. Rajagopalan was a Vice President and Partner with A.T. Kearney Consulting. During his tenure with A.T. Kearney, he focused on strategy, operations/procurement and e-business across a wide array of industries including technology services, hi-tech and manufacturing. Prior to joining A.T. Kearney, Mr. Rajagopalan was a consultant with PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP in its Strategic Management Consulting Group. Before embarking on his consulting career, Mr. Rajagopalan was a Lead Engineer with Harris Corporation in the commercial satellite communications arena. Mr. Rajagopalan earned a Master of Business Administration degree from The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, and holds Master of Science and Bachelor of Science degrees in engineering from Johns Hopkins University. He has been recognized as one of the “100 Most Influential Executive Recruiters in the World” by Business Week. He is also a recipient of the Distinguished Alumnus Award from Johns Hopkins University, a member of its G.W.C. Whiting School of Engineering National Advisory Council and a member of the US-China Business Council where he serves as Head of the Nominating Committee. We believe that Mr. Rajagopalan is qualified to serve on our board due to his extensive executive and management experience.
Madhavan “M.R.” Rangaswami will serve as a director upon the effectiveness of the registration statement to which this prospectus forms a part. Mr. Rangaswami is co-founder and Managing Director of Sand Hill Group, one of the earliest angel investment firms in Silicon Valley that was founded in 1997. He also served as a director at BDNA Inc., an enterprise technology company from 2000 until its acquisition in 2017. Prior to that, he served as Chief Marketing Officer at Baan Company from 1995 to 1996 and VP of Applications Marketing from 1988 to 1992 at Oracle Corporation where he helped launch products and markets. Mr. Rangaswami holds a Bachelor’s degree in Commerce and a Bachelor’s degree in Law from University of Madras and an MBA from Kent State University. We believe that Mr. Rangaswami is qualified to serve on our board due to his extensive investment experience and industry knowledge in software companies.
Mark Bailey will serve as a director upon the effectiveness of the registration statement to which this prospectus forms a part. He is a founder & partner of DFJ Growth in Menlo Park, California and has served in that capacity since its inception in September 2005. Mr. Bailey has served on the boards of directors of a number of companies, including Cylance, Inc. and Immuta, Inc. He holds a B.S.E. in electrical engineering and computer science from Princeton University and an MBA from Harvard University. We believe that Mr. Bailey is qualified to serve on our board due to his extensive investment and M&A experience.