early this year whispers started that tencent holdings operator of the ubiquitous wechat and qq social networking platforms and one of the worlds biggest technology investors was looking to dive deeper into the indian startup ecosystem while most such rumours are just that given the smoke and mirrors environment of the funding landscape the move by tencent to begin betting on earlytomidstage indian startups is a natural progression for asias most valuable company considering its extensive experience in its home market of china it is now possibly looking to transport that investment strategy to india tencent will probably have a threepronged strategy for india get in early while valuations are low outflank rival alibaba group and play a dominant role in shaping the startup ecosystem in a country where foreign investment regulations are still being formulated they are some of the smartest investors globally they understand the mobilefirst ecosystem better than anyone here they have seen the evolution in their own market have a great sense of what could work and hence are able to take aggressive bets at higher multiples says haresh chawla partner at private equity firm true north content with particular focus on video and spread across news social messaging entertainment and chat financial and on demand services along with healthcare are likely focus areas for the shenzhenbased company the intent to double down on investments was clearly laid out by tencent president martin lau at a press briefing last month where he stated that the company intended to chase growth potentially at the expense of profitability for 2018 we are planning to step up investments in a number of key areas these may negatively affect nearterm profitability but will generate longterm value and new growth opportunities for us lau was reported to have said as per et news reports tencent which had a market capitalisation of 47282 billion as of monday was exploring potential investments in two midstage startups sharechat and kissht that could see it write 515 million cheques the sense is that they tencent may be considering coming in early now while they may not look at the series a deals they may participate in the series b and c rounds and then possibly look to up the ante from there on says sunil jain founder of bengalurubased investment bank sprout capital first mover tencent wont be the first chinese investor to adopt this strategy fosun through its venture arm fosun rz capital and shunwei capital the venture capital firm started by smartphone maker xiaomi founder lei jun have beaten them to the draw fosun already has a separate team led by tej kapoor on ground with a specific mandate so far they have backed three startups delhivery kissht and ixigo ranging from series a to latestage deals in fact in terms of sheer volume the shanghaiheadquartered conglomerate has done nearly as many vc deals as they have done larger chequesized pe deals such as buying gland