Research Methodology

The research methodology used, is a ‘Mixed Methods’ approach and is ‘Explanatory’ in its research design.

The author(s) employs ‘Quantitative’ and ‘Qualitative’ approach for secondary and primary data collection, respectively and combining both to render the insights discussed in the following sections of the paper.

Area of Study

Focuses on a bringing about an explanatory perspective on the ‘Current state of the Indian Startup funding ecosystem’ and deriving relevant and data-driven rationale for highlighting the cause and effects for the same. The study restricts its context to the Indian Private Investment sector while following a micro and macro approach for collecting supporting data as a part of its quantitative - secondary research.

The reasons for employing this research design are due to the fact that most findings made at the secondary research stage needed contextual assessment of the information obtained through a qualitative study - through In-depth Interviews method of Primary Data collection.

The findings and observations obtained were correlational in their representation and validation of the narrations the study presents.

Sample Specifications

Size :

10 Interviews conducted, with respondents directly associated with the Area of Study in a full time capacity and geographically located within India.

Nature :

All the respondents/interviewees are investors running or employed in a

Venture Capital Fund or are active investors in Early Stage Start-ups at an Angle investor capacity.

Sampling Technique :

Purposeful sampling was used to include investors from firms that primarily focused on Early Stage Start-up investments in Indian start-ups raising Seed, Pre-Series A and Series A rounds of funding. The reason was the data represented anomalies with the consistency of the grand narration as ‘Early Stage Start-up investments not only saw a growth but appeared to be immune to the discussed market variables, relatively put.

This contradicting behavior further shaped the construct of the succeeding qualitative study.

Limitations and Exceptions

This study, is an explanatory piece which analyses and presents data that rationalizes the hypothesis statement to further gather evidence to support the narrations presented using primary data collection methods with the specified sample and does not aim to de-credit the views of anyone on the area of study.

For this study, the sample size is a relevant to only Early stage start-up venture capitals and investments and does not account for Late Stage or Public market data validations in a primary sense, reasons being; completely different behaviors in each stage with differing variables.