The Deal Creators

Why General Atlantic, which has returned $2.4 billion of the invested $2.6 billion in India and has been on an investment spree in the last three years, has an edge over its peers

- Pooja Sarka

In September 2013, Rizwan Kotia and Jagdish Moorjani, founders of Mumbai-based health tech services company CitiusTech, hired Citibank to find an investor for their company. After eight years of building the firm, the founders had decided to sell a minority stake. A six-monthlong process and multiple discussions later, in March 2014, global private equity fund General Atlantic (GA) emerged as the winner. It had beaten its peers like Warburg Pincus, ChrysCapital and Advent Capital, among others, to own a nearly 35 percent stake in the company for $110 million.

“There were two or three key reasons why we felt GA would be the right investors,” says Moorjani during a chat on a rainy afternoon in Mumbai. “We saw they had a terrific team and a very strong chemistry between their India and US offices— everyone was equally involved in the transaction. Also, they had a tremendous reputation of being a knowledgeable technology investor, and finally, we saw they had a good healthcare portfolio. Of course, the fact that they have a permanent fund structure without any lifetime gave them a further advantage,” he says.

Since GA invested in the company, it has helped Citius build a world-class board of directors, including the likes of Dr William Winkenwerder Junior as chairman of the company. Winkenwerder is one of the most influential names in the healthcare space in America. Apart from him, Gary Reiner, operating partner at GA LLC, is one of the directors on the board.

The fund also helped with the recruitment of senior management talent and establishment of strong financial processes and systems in the company.