The firm evaluates companies based on its belief that while some areas have been taken over by other countries, such as China in electric battery cells, there are spaces where Indian founders have a right to win. “Thermal energy storage is really attractive because industries fundamentally require heat,” said Shingati. “Storing heat directly is far more efficient and costs a third of battery storage. India is ahead of the curve on building that capability at the moment.”
To be sure, funding for nuclear energy startups has been nothing if not weak. Pranos Fusion raised a $6.8 million seed cheque in March from pi Ventures and Ankur Capital. In 2024, Hylenr Technologies raised $3 million in a pre-series A round from Valour Capital and Chhattisgarh Investments, while Anubal Fusion raised $294,000 from longtime deeptech investor Speciale Invest that year as well.
As a result, the firm is selective even in how it backs winners in its portfolio so that it has enough capital to be able to allocate to future rounds to maintain the stakes it has. Transition has no plans to hold just 5% by the time it's ready to exit.
“When we're prepared to exit, whether at a series D, pre-IPO or IPO, we want to still be holding 15-20%,” said Shingati. “That's a very massive outcome, because the MOIC comes from absolute returns on your stake ownership, rather than how big a company becomes.” MOIC stands for multiple on invested capital, a metric used by venture capital and private equity firms to track the absolute return on an investment.
Transition's Fund I consists of a portfolio of 23 companies, with the firm expecting to be fully deployed by the end of 2026. According to the firm, Fund I has so far delivered a 57% internal rate of return and generated over 3x MOIC. Fund II will see the firm back 20 startups.
Rwit Ghosh
Rwit is a correspondent at Mint covering India’s burgeoning startup ecosystem and the venture capital and private equity firms that back them. Sitting out of Bengaluru, he writes on the new-age tech businesses that the city and the rest of the country seems to continuously be birthing. While Rwit’s interests lie in covering the new wave of deeptech, AI, SaaS and consumer tech businesses, he’ll write on consumer brands and fintech (if someone repeatedly explains these sectors to him). When he’s not scrolling through the Indian startup forums on Reddit, Rwit is usually trying to figure out early signs of what’s to come next in the ecosystem. As a result, he’s been early to spot trends like VCs becoming more active in backing deeptech, funding bottlenecks for agentic AI startups and a potential revival in edtech through AI. Prior to his ongoing stint at Mint, Rwit worked at NDTV Profit as a social media producer while also working on his own stories for the TV channel after he graduated from the Asian College of Journalism in Chennai. When he’s not working on stories, he can be found trying to figure out where he should go to eat next in Bengaluru, or what his next tattoo should look like. If you see him in the wild, you should ask him how he pronounces his name. He’s definitely not tired of being asked about it.