Scott Shleifer, New York-based Tiger Global’s head for private investments, will be in India next week in what will be his first such trip here since at least Covid-19 and he took over the mandate to look after India investments, multiple sources aware of the matter said.

He took over Tiger Global’s India investments from Lee Fixel, after the latter moved on from the fund to start his own venture, Addition.

Tiger Global is one of the most aggressive investors globally and in India, having backed companies like Flipkart, Ola, Razorpay and Upstox over the years. Shleifer is coming to India at a time when a slowdown in venture funding has set in here.

Shleifer will be meeting multiple portfolio firms as well as senior internet industry executives from existing portfolio companies, people aware of the matter said.

“There are meetings planned next week. He is here at least for a few days. Of course, portfolio firms will get to update him on their performance as well as seek advice to weather the stormy economic conditions,” one of the people said.

As per an earlier report, India had emerged as a major highlight for the influential technology investor at a time it is raising a smaller-than-anticipated new fund of $6 billion. The new fund, which is in the making, is substantially smaller than the $12.7 billion technology vehicle it closed last year. This signals the first big downturn in over two decades for the technology world globally, even as there are comparisons being drawn to the dotcom bubble burst of 2000-2001.

Shleifer’s top lieutenant, Alex Cook, was recently in India, meeting some of the portfolio founders at a time when late-stage deals were starting to slow down here.

Venture funding for Indian startups fell to $2.7 billion for the September quarter this year, as against nearly $12 billion that companies had raised during the same period last year, according to Venture Intelligence, which tracks startup funding data.

“He (Shleifer) is also lined up to meet some of the top startup entrepreneurs, regardless of whether Tiger Global has invested in them,” said the person cited earlier.

“In India, where we have built a leading brand and portfolio over more than 15 years, both B2B and consumer categories are significantly underpenetrated relative to other large markets,” according to a letter Tiger Global had sent to its limited partners (LPs) last month.

Tiger Global said in the letter that it had started to take more early-stage bets across geographies including in India. “We anticipate that PIP (Tiger Global Private Investment Partners LP) 16 will similarly benefit from the differentiated access to compelling early-stage investments largely in enterprise themes and in India and will do so in a lower-valuation market,” it said.

Among the largest tech-focussed funds globally, Tiger Global had noted that India’s Of Business, a business-to-business ecommerce firm for raw material procurement, was one such bet where it had a meaningful holding and which had grown quickly with compelling margins.