Global equity investment and advisory firm Blackstone has said it was open to come up with an India dedicated fund for infusing capital into corporates depending on response to its initial $1billion investment."The $1 billion is only a beginning. If deal flow is encouraging, we should be raising India dedicated funds," Blackstone MD Akhil Ggupta said.Justifying the India entry of Blackstone, whose primary markets are the US and Western Europe, Gupta said the group had done enough due diligence on the economy and its potential.India was selected for its operations ahead of BRIC (Brazil, Russia and China) nations and Japan due to the country's economic strengths, demography and democracy, Gupta, a former top Reliance official, said.Asked was there any weakenesses in the economy, Akhil said, "yesterday's underperformance is today's opportunity."Blackstone, which selected India as the destination for FDI in the Asian economies, has set a cap of Rs 100 crore on investments in various sectors, including retail, BPO and IT-enabled services.Gupta made it clear that Blackstone would be investing in those entities that have excellent management, good growth prospects and competitive advantage."We are agnostic on sector and size," Gupta said adding that the group would invest whereever there was scope for improving value addition and needed private equity.Globally it has a target investment of $100-400 million in the identified sectors, but in India it had set a target of Rs 100 crore irrespective of the sectors and size of the industry.
