Alteria Capital has deployed a record $90 million in venture debt deals in the first six months of the calendar year 2021, as venture debt becomes more mainstream in India’s fast-growing startup ecosystem that is churning out unicorns at a record pace.

“In H1CY21, Alteria funded more than 20 companies with total commitments of $90 million. This is by far the largest deployment in such a period and a sign of the increasing maturity of the ecosystem. A few years ago, the size of the entire market used to be around this much,” said Vinod Murali, managing partner of Alteria Capital.

Alteria, founded by Murali and Ajay Hattangadi, is raising its second debt fund for which it has already achieved a first close of Rs 1,325 crore.

For its first fund, the firm had raised Rs 960 crore in 2019. Some recent deals done by Alteria include Infra. Market, Deal share and Mensa Brands. Sectors that have been in vogue include consumer, financial services and B2B platforms. But one emerging sector that has been in focus recently is the Thrasio model, Murali said. “We have partnered with Mensa with a commitment of $10 million upfront. This model relies on focused identification of consumer brands and strong execution but equally needs the leverage to construct to be in place for the business model to be attractive. While large equity cheques are showing interest, the debt is an important variable for this model to succeed,” he said.

“We have also seen special situations like acquisition fin-ance as in the case for Exotel where we helped finance their recent acquisition of Ameyo,” Murali said.