About SHAKTI
SHAKTI is a venture capital firm founded in 2020. It is primarily based out of San Francisco, United States. As of Mar 2026, SHAKTI is an active investor, having invested in 43 companies, with 2 new investments in the last 12 months. It primarily invests in Seed round in United States based startups. Its investments are spread across a wide range of sectors from Enterprise Applications to High Tech and Retail. Most recently it participated in the $***** Seed round of NextWork Overall, SHAKTI portfolio has seen 2 IPOs and 3 acquisitions including key companies like The RealReal, Pipedrive and Backblaze. A lot of funds co-invest with SHAKTI, with names like Ram Shriram sharing a substantial percentage of its portfolio. SHAKTI has team of 4 people including 2 partners.Key Metrics
Team Members
Portfolio Count
Portfolio Sectors
Portfolio Locations
Rounds of Entry
Seed & Series A
Portfolio IPOs
Portfolio Acquisitions
SHAKTI's List of Top Investments
SHAKTI has a portfolio of 43 companies. Their most notable investments are in Gimbal Space and NextWork.Their portfolio spans across United States, Australia, India and 4 more locations. They have invested in Enterprise Applications, High Tech, Retail and 21 other sectors, across stages such as Seed, Series A stages. Here is the list of top investments by SHAKTI:
1. Canva
Cloud-based collaborative design platform. It enables users to create various digital content, including social media posts, presentations, and videos, through its drag-and-drop editor. The platform provides access to thousands of templates, photos, and fonts, and offers AI-powered tools for users to enhance design abilities. It allows users to edit images for presentations, invitations, posters, flyers, business cards, and more. The platform offers pre-designed templates and effects. It also provides a stock library of photographs, illustrations, and images.
Key facts about Canva
- Founded Year: 2012
- Location: Surry Hills (Australia)
- Annual Revenue: $500M - $1B as on Dec 31, 2022
- Valuation: $*****
- Stage: Series F
- Total Funding till date: $589M
- Employee Count: 17,467 as on Jun 30, 2026
- Investors: T. Rowe Price, Dragoneer Investment Group and 55 Others
- Latest Funding Round: Series F, May 01, 2024, $*****
- Highlight: Editors' Pick
2. The RealReal
Online consignment-based marketplace for luxury fashion. The product catalog includes apparel for men & women of used products. It also offers jewelry and fashion accessories.
Key facts about The RealReal
- Founded Year: 2011
- Location: Tiburon (United States)
- Stage: Public
- Total Funding till date: $288M
- Employee Count: 2,610 as on May 31, 2026
- Investors: HTIF, OGGI Equity and 37 Others
- Latest Funding Round: Post IPO, Mar 04, 2021, $*****
- Highlight: Public
3. Pipedrive
Provider of customer relationship management software and sales pipeline tools. The platform offers features such as lead management, sales automation, and reporting. It provides integrations with other business applications. The software helps teams manage customer data, track sales activities, and automate sales processes.
Key facts about Pipedrive
- Founded Year: 2010
- Location: Tallinn (Estonia)
- Annual Revenue: €0 - €1M as on Dec 31, 2023
- Last Known Valuation: $*****
- Stage: Acquired
- Total Funding till date: $91.1M
- Employee Count: 1,054 as on Jun 30, 2026
- Investors: Storm Ventures, Insight Partners and 24 Others
- Latest Funding Round: Series C, Jun 14, 2018, $*****
- Highlight: Acquired
4. Abacus.AI
Provides AI based data models creation for data science. The main use cases are marketing and sales. It uses artificial intelligence and allows users to create custom models. It provides marketing teams with the ability to predict customer churn and provides sales teams with predictive lead scoring and sales forecasting.
Key facts about Abacus.AI
- Founded Year: 2019
- Location: San Francisco (United States)
- Stage: Series C
- Total Funding till date: $90.3M
- Employee Count: 267 as on Jun 30, 2026
- Investors: Tiger Global Management, La Famiglia and 22 Others
- Latest Funding Round: Series C, Oct 27, 2021, $*****
- Highlight: Editors' Pick
5. Vahan
Provider of an AI-powered platform for blue and grey collar recruitment. The platform offers businesses tools to streamline workforce scaling through recruitment and staffing. It automates hiring processes and facilitates access to a pool of workers. The platform focuses on improving worker supply and reducing hiring turnaround times for businesses.
Key facts about Vahan
- Founded Year: 2016
- Location: Bengaluru (India)
- Annual Revenue: ₹10 - ₹50 Cr as on Mar 31, 2025
- Valuation: $*****
- Stage: Series B
- Total Funding till date: $23.7M
- Employee Count: 198 as on Aug 31, 2025
- Investors: Locus Ventures, Script Capital and 37 Others
- Latest Funding Round: Series B, Jul 30, 2025, $*****
- Highlight: Editors' Pick
SHAKTI's Year-on-Year Investment Trends
SHAKTI has invested in 43 companies over the last 17 years, with an average of 2 new investments annually in the last 10 years. In 2025, it made 3 investments, while as of Mar 2026, it has made 1 investment in this year. Its most recent first time investment was in NextWork and most recent follow-on round was in alphaXiv.Year | No. of Investments | ||
|---|---|---|---|
1st Round | Follow-on | Total | |
2026 (YTD) | 1 | 0 | 1 |
2025 | 2 | 1 | 3 |
2024 | 4 | 0 | 4 |
2023 | 3 | 0 | 3 |
2022 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
2021 | 7 | 0 | 7 |
2020 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
2019 | 2 | 0 | 2 |
2018 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
2017 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
SHAKTI's Investments by Stage
SHAKTI has made 19 investments in Seed stage with an average round size of $2.94M and 5 investments in Series A stage with an average round size of $9.44M.Stage of entry | No. of Investments |
|---|---|
Seed | 19 |
Series A | 5 |
Note: We have considered here, only first round of investments
SHAKTI's Investments by Sector
SHAKTI has a diverse portfolio, with companies operating in the Enterprise Applications, Consumer, Enterprise Infrastructure, High Tech and Media & Entertainment. Notably, it has invested in 40 Tech companies, 31 Enterprise (B2B) companies, 30 Software companies and at least 16 companies focusing on Saas.Sector | No. of Investments |
|---|---|
Enterprise Applications | 11 |
Consumer | 6 |
Enterprise Infrastructure | 3 |
High Tech | 3 |
Media & Entertainment | 3 |
Others | 22 |
Note: We have considered here, only first round of investments
SHAKTI's Investments by Geography
SHAKTI has made most investments in United States (17), followed by Australia where it has made 2 investments.Country | No. of Investments |
|---|---|
United States | 17 |
Australia | 2 |
India | 2 |
Canada | 1 |
New Zealand | 1 |
Others | 1 |
Note: We have considered here, only first round of investments
SHAKTI's recent investments
SHAKTI has made 1 investments in 2026 so far - NextWork.Here are the most recent investments by SHAKTI:
Filter this listDate | Company | Location | Round Details | Round Amount | Co-Investors |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Mar 04, 2026 | New Zealand | Seed | 2232 | [+4] | |
Nov 19, 2025 | United States | Seed | 9886 | [+9] | |
Sep 25, 2025 | India | Seed | 2926 | [+2] | |
Mar 25, 2025 | United States | Seed | 4192 | - | |
Nov 21, 2024 | United States | Seed | 3388 | [+2] |
IPOs and Publicly Listed companies in SHAKTI's Portfolio
2 of SHAKTI's portfolio companies have become public. Backblaze got listed on the National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations (NASDAQ), in Nov 2021 at marketcap of $468M and The RealReal got listed on the National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations (NASDAQ) at marketcap of $1.65B.Here are SHAKTI's portfolio companies that went public:
Company | IPO Date | First Invested on | First Round of Investment | Round Size |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Nov 11, 2021 | Apr 15, 2009 | Seed | 3711 | |
Jun 28, 2019 | - | - | 6838 |
Acquired companies in SHAKTI's Portfolio
3 companies from SHAKTI's portfolio have been acquired. The most recent acquisition was Pipedrive in Nov 2020 by Vista Equity Partners for $*****.Here are SHAKTI's portfolio companies that got acquired most recently:
Company | Acquisition Date | First Invested on | First Round of Investment | Round Size |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Nov 12, 2020 | - | - | 1010 | |
Sep 03, 2020 | - | - | 7679 | |
Jul 15, 2019 | - | - | 6913 |
Team profile of SHAKTI
SHAKTI has a team of 4 members including 2 Partners located in United States. SHAKTI's team does not sit on the board of any company as of now.Co-investors of SHAKTI
Over the past 17 years, 149 investors have co-invested in SHAKTI's portfolio companies. This includes funds and angels.
- Invested before SHAKTI: Y Combinator, Khosla Ventures and 38 others have invested in rounds before SHAKTI. There are 4 companies where Y Combinator has invested before SHAKTI and 1 company where Khosla Ventures has invested before SHAKTI.
- Top Co-investors of SHAKTI: 50 investors entered a company along with SHAKTI. These include investors like Ram Shriram (2 companies).
- Invested after SHAKTI: A total of 59 investors have invested in SHAKTI's portfolio after their investments. Top Investors include Bessemer Venture Partners (2 companies), Sequoia Capital (1 company) and Blackbird Ventures (1 company).
Recent News related to SHAKTI
•
NextWork Raises $4.45M in Seed FundingFinSMEs•Mar 04, 2026•NextWork, SHAKTI, Global From Day One, Cake Ventures and 3 others
•
AlphaXiv Secures $7M Funding to Revolutionize AI Research as the GitHub of AISiliconAngle•Nov 19, 2025•alphaXiv, SHAKTI, Haystack, Menlo Ventures and 4 others
•
Indian space tech startup Cosmoserve raises $3.17 millionEvertiq•Oct 31, 2025•Cosmoserv, SHAKTI, Aum Ventures
•
Cosmoserve Space secures $3.17 Mn in pre-seed roundEntrackr•Sep 25, 2025•Cosmoserv, Aum Ventures, SHAKTI, Purple Style Labs and 5 others
•
Australian Pinterest for recipes platform serves up $4.15 million Seed roundStartup Daily•Dec 11, 2023•Blackbird Ventures, Clove, SHAKTI
•
Betteromics Raises $20M in Series A FinancingFinSMEs•Oct 26, 2023•Betteromics, Sofinnova Partners, Triatomic, SHAKTI
