gradCapital has launched its second fund with a total size of $6 million, dedicated to investing in student startups. The company also offers a standard investment of $40,000 for a 4% equity stake.

Funded students are invited to participate in a 4-week cohort in Bangalore, where they have the opportunity to get mentored by industry experts like Tarun Mehta (co-founder, Ather Energy), Shashank (co-founder, Razorpay), and Kailash Nadh (CTO, Zerodha), who provide guidance to the students.

Many of the companies that go through the gradCapital cohort go on to secure follow-on investments, with Lightspeed and Rainmatter Capital being notable investors in these companies. gradCapital selects 20 teams out of approximately 3,000 applicants each year.

Abhishek, co-founder & CEO of gradCapital said, "We are not in the business of finding and investing in deals, we are in the business of letting students be more ambitious and build a future, despite having a challenging education system. Being a student also has an unfair advantage: building with friends, not being scared of thinking big, and being scrappy/ fast with their project."

gradCapital was founded in 2021 by BITS/IIMA alumni  Abhishek Sethi and Prateek Behera. They started by conducting a cohort of five teams to help them get into Y Combinator (YC), with Zepto being one of the teams. Subsequently, gradCapital raised a $1 million fund, which has since grown to approximately twice its initial value within 18 months.