Economic Times | Jan 23, 2012

By Biswarup Gooptu, ET Bureau

“The turmoil in microfinance and concerns about corporate governance inflicted collateral damage on social enterprises last year, making venture capital investors wary of putting their money in businesses aimed at low-income communities.

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Investors are also bemoaning the small pool of what they call “investible companies” in the space, pointing out that the companies’ ability for capacity-building are quite limited.

“The investment-worthy social enterprises are few in India, and a lot of us are chasing the same targets. The valuations of the ones getting chased are huge, and they have multiple term sheets. But, there are very few companies, which not only have a great business story, but are also scalable,” observes Digbijoy Shukla, a director at social venture capital firm Ennovent.”

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