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Ashish Bhatia and the business of learning the hard way
After a career in corporate technology, Ashish Bhatia discovered how much he still had to learn about startups. India Accelerator grew out of that uncomfortable education.
India Accelerator Wants a Seat at the Workbench
The Gurugram firm has built a business around the work that follows a funding announcement. Its bet: founders need help finding customers, testing assumptions and opening industry doors as much as they need capital.
The Fund That Bets on 30 Companies and Backs Teenagers
While rivals raise billion-dollar megafunds, A* is doing the opposite: fewer bets, bigger conviction, and a willingness to wire money to founders who are not old enough to rent a car.
Phin Barnes
Phin Barnes is a co-founder and Managing Partner of The General Partnership (TheGP), a $300M seed-stage VC firm built on a 'sweat equity' model that pairs capital with embedded operational talent. Before TheGP, he spent 13 years at First Round Capital rising from unpaid intern to General Partner, co-created the Dorm Room Fund, and backed companies like Notion. His pre-VC career included scaling AND1 sneakers from $15M to $225M and founding one of the first fitness video games for Xbox and PlayStation 2 - making him one of the few investors who can say they've run a shoe brand, shipped a console game, and written the check.