Venu Pemmaraju is retiring 10 years after launching IT services provider Wipro's $500m corporate VC unit with co-managing partner Biplab Adhya.
Venu Pemmaraju has retired after a decade of co-heading Indian IT services firm Wipro’s Silicon Valley-based venture arm.
Pemmaraju launched Wipro Ventures as a $100m fund in 2015 with Biplab Adhya, co-running it with him before the unit added a third managing partner, Ali Wasti, earlier this year. Wipro provided a further $200m to the fund’s reserves last month, bringing its overall size to $500m.
Adhya told GCV in 2022: “Venu came in steeped in a CVC background and I came in primarily from an operational role; prior to Wipro I was in the enterprise application space.
“So, when we got started, it was a mix of two sets of experiences that helped us launch Wipro Ventures: me primarily looking at how technologies we are evaluating would make sense from a strategic rationale, and Venu bringing in the contacts and perspective of corporate investing into the decisions we make.”
Prior to joining Wipro, Pemmaraju had logged 15 years as an investment director at Intel Capital, following roles in product development and marketing. He and Adhya made the GCV Powerlist in 2019.
Wipro Ventures has approximately 25 active portfolio companies. Its exits during Pemmaraju’s stint included Cloudgenix, acquired by Palo Alto Networks for $420m in 2020, and IntSights, which was bought by Rapid7 for $335m the following year.
Pemmaraju thanked his colleagues today in a LinkedIn post, saying they “played a crucial role in evaluating investment opportunities, sponsoring investments, and taking startup solutions to Wipro’s clients. Without their contribution, we couldn’t have achieved what we did.
“As the saying goes, in venture capital, your success is often reflected by the company you keep.”
