People
Kanwal Singh
Kanwal has been passionate about mentoring and helping build consumer brands in India, and has been involved as an investor with brands like Paper Boat, ID Fresh, Epigamia, and Licious, before starting Fireside. He has been investing in the early stage ecosystem in India for the past 17 years, first as a Director at Carlyle Group, India, and later as a Co-Founder and Senior Managing Director of Helion Venture Partners. Prior to his investing career, Kanwal spent over 13 years in consumer marketing with Hindustan Unilever, and Intel India.
Vinay Singh
With 7+ years at Hindustan Unilever as Marketing Manager for a multi-crore brand, extensive expertise in digital marketing at McKinsey & Co., and Bankbazaar.com, Vinay has a unique perspective on the intersection between consumer brands and technology. He has also been an entrepreneur, as the founder and CEO of Stepni.com, which was acquired by Quikr.
VS Kannan Sitaram
Kannan has spent 36+ years across Sales, Marketing, and Strategy. He has been associated with Unilever, both, in India, and overseas. He has also been COO of Dabur India, and CEO of Innovative Foods. His ability to understand the finer nuances of brand-building at different stages of the brand evolution makes him ideally suited to the role of partner and mentor to young entrepreneurs and brand champions.
Dipanjan Basu
Dipanjan has over 17 years’ experience ranging across the e-commerce consumer space, digital brands, the start-up ecosystem, Investments and M&A apart from his deep knowledge in Finance, Technology and Operations. Prior to Fireside Ventures, in his role as CFO of Myntra and Jabong, he played a key role in driving a balanced and profitable growth and creating innovative brand building structures such as the Brand Accelerator and House of Brands. Before Myntra, he was the Chief Finance & Operating Officer for Wipro’s Digital & Consulting Business where he was responsible for setting up and building new businesses, as well as helming M&As and investments in digital startups. He was also part of the team setting up Wipro Ventures, the $100Mn fund for tech and digital businesses.
Prayag Mohanty
Prayag has spent over 11 years in venture capital, investment banking, and software development. Prior to Fireside Ventures, he was at IvyCap Ventures, focusing on early-stage consumer and enterprise technology startups, including BiryaniByKilo, Bluestone, Vinculum, GrabOnRent, FieldEz, and RMLAgtech. He also led the domestic institutional fund-raising activities for the Fund. At SBI Capital Markets, he was part of the ECM vertical where he was involved in the several closures, including the marquee follow-on public offering of $700 million by Tata Steel. Prayag also actively engaged with the Department of Disinvestment for managing the sale of shares by the Government of India including the $200 million stake sale in Engineers India through a follow-on public offering, and the $110 million stake sale in National Aluminium Company via an OFS.
Amit Kulkarni
With over eight years’ experience in statutory audit and corporate finance, Amit has worked with a variety of clients, including listed IT companies, startups, and retail clients. Prior to Fireside, he has gained extensive knowledge in financial accounting/ reporting at EY Statutory Audit. As AGM, Corporate Finance, at Manipal Health Enterprises, in addition to his Corporate Finance responsibilities, he participated in Project Dhrishti, focusing on finance automation. Amit is also a Chartered Accountant.
Anshul Bansal
With 6+ years of experience in investment banking and consulting, Anshul is a great believer in the power of Indian brands and their potential to capture domestic/international markets. Prior to Fireside Ventures, he was a part of the investment banking team at Avendus Capital. During his 3 years at Avendus, Anshul was part of 4 financing and M&A transactions which helped clients raise in excess of $270+ million in capital. He has also worked with Bain Capability Centre (Gurgaon) and Mercedes Benz Research Center (Bangalore).
Navjot Kaur
With over 8 years’ experience in digital content and entertainment, early-stage startup consulting, and investment research, Navjot brings with her a deep understanding of the digital and e-commerce consumer space. Prior to Fireside Ventures, she has designed and launched new business verticals to support exponential revenue growth at BookMyShow, as well as led the digital and product development initiatives across 8 business verticals for large events such as IPL, U2, Bryan Adams, and Cirque du Soleil. She has also been at Netscribes, setting up and helming a 100-member team to co-create a SAAS product, and a global database for the PE and VC ecosystem, for key clients like Motley Fool and Pitchbook Data.
Ramani Agharkar
Having started her career as a consultant at the office of Adil Zainulbhai, former head of McKinsey India, Ramani has assisted top bureaucrats on high-priority government projects across sectors such as oil and gas, healthcare, and intellectual property. She also co-founded WayCool Labs, the technology arm of WayCool Foods and Products, an agritech company; building tech solutions to solve problems across the agri and food value chain in India. Prior to this, she was part of the early team of a high-growth SaaS company at HyperVerge and Indus Momentus Business Solutions. She managed operations for education enterprise, Avanti Fellows, in her undergraduate years, and has received her B.Tech. and M.Tech. in Engineering from IIT Madras.
Anupam Soni
With 3+ years in investing and technology, Anupam has been focused on the education and fintech sectors with Bertelsmann Investments, a growth-stage venture fund focused on tech-enabled businesses. As a tech consultant at Cisco, he was awarded the Services Excellence Award across Asia Pacific for helming project engagements of $15+ million for Tier 1 clients in Australia and the Middle East. His previous stints range from investment banking at JP Morgan to product management at Inmobi, and he remains a staunch believer in building next-gen iconic brands.
Abhiram Bhalerao
With almost three years’ experience in venture capital and private equity investing, Abhiram has focused on the consumer space at IIFL Private Equity, where he was named Most Promising Analyst. Prior to this, he co-authored a detailed report on the Indian consumer industry at Invest India. A firm believer in India’s consumer brand story, he has also been at Deloitte and EY. A Global Shaper at the World Economic Forum, Abhiram is also a rank-holder member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India.
Ramya
With 10+ years at large MNCs like LeEco, Mercedes-Benz R&D India, P&G, and HP, Ramya has supported global and national leadership teams in Administration, HR, Procurement, Events and Budget functions in diverse cross-cultural environments. Passionate, self-driven, and creative, she is an exceptional organiser, and provides invaluable critical support to the entire Fireside team.
Richa Gupta
With over 12 years of experience in Hospitality and HR at Jet Airways, JW Marriott, and the Essar Group, Richa is a reliable team member with a positive outlook towards life. Obsessed with the idea of never-ending learning journeys, she constantly seeks to challenge her capabilities, and brings this zest to the Fireside team.
Shiva
With 18+ years of experience, Shiva has been at companies such as Helion Advisors, Carlyle Advisors, and Textual Analytics, handling a multitude of responsibilities spanning office administration, vendor relationship, and visitor management. His talents include multilinguism, and he is fluent in Hindi, Telugu, Kannada, and Tamil in addition to English. Inspired by the energy of the young entrepreneurs we partner with, Shiva is an essential part of the Fireside team.