The Consummate | 31 December 2023
Welcome to The Consummate! We bring our points of view, updates, news, and curated content to the consumer community in India and Southeast Asia.
For our final edition of 2023, we wanted to pause and look back on the highlights of the eventful year we’ve had. Let’s dive in!
Our Year in Review
We closed our Fund IV at $114 million
We are incredibly grateful and proud to have closed Fund IV earlier this year. We are especially pleased that 72% of the capital for Fund IV was raised from existing LPs who have backed us across our earlier funds. DSGCP IV has already partnered with Farmley, Go Desi, KNYA, Bombay Banta, Go Zero and Merlin Brands in India, Blood and Moom that operate in Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia, Pickup Coffee in the Philippines, Coolmate and Marathon Education in Vietnam. We look forward to doubling down on our conviction in the consumer opportunity and building for the next 10 years, brick by brick!
We welcomed new additions to the DSGCP family!
We’re proud to have backed mission-driven founders building for the new age consumer across India and SEA. We welcome our newest additions to the DSGCP family; Blood, Bombay Banta, Go Zero, Merlin Brands, Pickup Coffee, and Rose All Day.
We announced promotions and a new hire to strengthen our leadership team
At DSG Consumer Partners, we are building a different type of venture capital firm focused on partnering with the next generation of insurgent consumer brand founders. We promoted Hariharan Premkumar to Managing Director and Pooja Shirali to Vice President. We also welcomed Anushka Bharvani full-time as Vice President (Marketing, Branding and Consumer Insights). These two promotions and our new hire are a testament to our focus on building the best team possible to deliver on our commitment to deliver value to our founders.
DSGCP x Bain & Company: We launched 2 reports across India & SEA
In SEA, we partnered with Meta and Bain & Company to publish Bold Moves: Leading Southeast Asia’s next wave of consumer growth. We uncover 7 consumer trends that will present significant opportunities for founders and business leaders looking to ride the next wave of consumer growth.
In India, we partnered with Bain & Company to publish Gamechangers: The Insurgent Consumer Brands Playbook. The report delves into the strategies and successes of insurgent brands, providing some insight into their disproportionate growth and a playbook for capital-efficient scaling. Additionally, it offers a view into the consumers of today and of the future and how brands can tap into some of this consumer revolution as part of their playbooks to scale.
We debuted our POV on sustainability with The Balancing Act
In February 2023, we released the 1st DSG Consumer Partners Sustainability Report. Our aim for our portfolio companies is for them to first focus on people and prosperity without which there can be no sustainable business development, something that is even more salient in the developing regions we invest in.
We measure progress against goals, share best practices from across our portfolio, as well as build resources to enable all other portfolio companies to craft their path to building a sustainable business that endures. Our desire is for our portfolio companies to take small but tangible, measurable steps rather than make tall empty promises.
We hosted 6 sessions of Brick by Brick: Building Insurgent Brands with some of the brightest minds in the consumer ecosystem
We had the privilege of discussing all things consumer like offline expansion, channel strategy, innovation & NPD, sustainability, and brand building on first principles thinking with founders and business leaders.
Most recently, we had the privilege of hosting Saket Gore, Ex CEO Asia Pacific, Himalaya Wellness Company on Brick by Brick: Building Insurgent Brands. In conversation with DSGCP's Sameer Mehta, Saket shares his experience building Himalaya for over 15 years in and outside India, specifically Indonesia.
Tune in to this insightful episode on category creation, consumer insights, NPD & innovation, general trade and much more!
We hosted our First In-Person Investor Meeting Post Covid
We’re grateful to all our LPs who flew in from the US, Europe and Asia, to join us for our annual Investor Meeting. We had a wonderful day of fireside chats and panel discussions featuring founders from the DSGCP portfolio and business leaders from the ecosystem.
Last, but not least, our 2023 brand & website refresh
After an exciting decade, we’re thrilled to launch our fresh new look. Our brand and website refresh is a culmination of our journey so far. It's not just a facelift; it’s a return to our core values and why we exist as a firm: to be the partner choice for consumer entrepreneurs building the next wave of insurgent consumer brands.
What an incredible year 2023 has been! Thank you for joining us on this journey, we’re excited for the coming year. Happy New Year and see you in 2024!