Apax Partners stays positive on India, eyeing consumer and tech investments

what happened

According to TradingView, private equity firm Apax Partners still sees room to invest in India, with its focus on consumer and technology businesses. Co-CEO Mitch Truwit acknowledged that a slower GDP expansion, inflation and tax worries have made the country less appealing to some investors in the short run, but he remains hopeful about its long-term outlook. “I see opportunity. We're longer-term investors,” he said.

Apax has been investing in Indian companies for 20 years and says it has created $10 billion of value for its backers there. Partner and India head Harjot Dhaliwal described the market as very successful for the firm and pointed to consumers who are increasingly trading up, and to technology firms that help enterprises adopt AI.

The firm is also watching health and wellness, clean-label goods and foods with fewer preservatives, as well as business services, where growing formalisation of the economy could help. It sees AI as both a threat to existing business models and a source of productivity gains, and believes Indian IT service providers can help clients build AI into their systems.

why it matters

With foreign portfolio investors recently pulling significant sums from Indian equities, a public vote of confidence from a major private equity player offers a counterpoint to the pessimism, though this is an executive interview rather than an announced deal.

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