D. Murali, C. Ramesh

Not many people would readily answer to a wide range of titles like angel investor, venture capitalist, entrepreneur, film producer, chip company founder and more. But the insatiable desire to trek from one venture to another is a characteristic that Raj Singh shares with few. Especially in Silicon Valley, where he made his millions by founding jackpot startup Fiberlane and following it up with many more companies. And for a man with such an illustrious track record as his, he is disarmingly candid about his failures and “lack of sectoral knowledge.”

Speaking to Business Line, Raj Singh, who was recently in India, said that though he’s undoubtedly famous, he has not met with much success as an investor. “I am definitely a successful entrepreneur, somehow. While my Redwood Venture investments are made like any other VC, in a professional way, and I have incubated some big successes such as Magma Design Automation, many of my personal investments were made simply to enable fresh teams into trying entrepreneurship.”

The founder and Director of Hindustan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation (HSMC), which recently announced a $4.5-billion investment for chip manufacturing in India, Raj Singh has strong words and views on the semiconductor industry in the country.

“Every emerging economy has to make bold statements in sectors of national importance. For example, China decided it was in its interest to have semiconductor manufacturing on the mainland and they made it happen. Recently, they saw aerospace the same way and have decided to manufacture aircraft on the mainland. For India, semiconductor manufacturing falls in the same category and the Government has to do all it can to enable this industry, sooner than later, by envisioning the shape of things to come in the next 5-10 years, and not 2-5 years.”

Defining a good investment, he said that it is usually based on personal intuition and into a good team, not necessarily based upon sector knowledge.

“I have very little knowledge of any sector, even of those companies I have started myself. For instance, I started Cerent in telecom whereas my background is in electronic design automation software in the US, or in real-time application software in India at TIFR.” He informed that in Stratumone Communications, which he started for telecom chips, the main ASIC was designed by a software engineer who had never done any ASIC before.

Raj Singh firmly believes that sector knowledge can sometimes be a barrier to risk taking. And that simply won’t do in a place like the Valley. “Valley culture definitely plays a big role as its ecosystem is very conducive to innovation. One can easily find talents in a hi-tech space of one’s interest, which can be pretty diverse.”

And those diverse interests include, most unusually for a VC, films. Raj Singh’s Kundalini Pictures offers a bouquet of services such as production financing, physical production logistics in India and South Asia, content development, and marketing, distribution and sales.

So why did an optical networking guru choose to dabble in cinema? “My film investments were primarily to give a break to Indian film makers graduating from film schools in the US. It also gave me an opportunity to work with great Indian and American talents in cinema, and learn the whole process of making a film, up to distribution through film festivals, agents, satellite and the Internet.”

On plans for India in this regard, he said: “I have definite plans to bring next generation animation tools to India in order to train 2D artists into 3D animation with great ease. That can give an edge to the Indian animation industry to be on par with Hollywood studios.”

Raj Singh, who counts Dev Anand, Waheeda Rehman and Raj Kapoor among favourites from yesteryears, is impressed with the work of current generation stalwarts such as Farhan Akhtar, Sanjay Leela Bhansali and Aamir Khan. Shekhar Kapur is his latest favourite.

“My biggest favourite movie is Guide, which I would like to produce as a Broadway show. I have seen dozens of Broadway shows and Guide makes perfect sense. I have also developed a story for a movie and its screenplay is written by a Hollywood scriptwriter.”

A man passionate about films, Raj Singh brings the same passion to the startups he backs. “I have been very involved with my startups, but in a very informal way and only if the management had a desire for my involvement. I have taken board seats if needed by the investment I make.”

And it is the right team that gets his nod for financial support. “It is the team that counts the most, be it a startup or a revenue stage company. The management team is the key to the success of any enterprise. If the CEO can effectively delegate the work, and reduce dependencies, it certainly helps. Of course, it is important that the CEO has hired capable persons worthy of delegation.”

Raj Singh, who has stopped investing in individual capacity, holds out the assessment of risk factors as key to a venture’s success. “There are three risks involved: market risk, technology risk and execution risk. The last one makes or breaks a venture. Assessment of a team determines the execution risk. All these factors have different levels in service venture compared to product ventures, since a service venture has no product to be developed and involves largely execution.”

In his book, the real entrepreneur is one with perseverance, is persistent and is able to adapt to the market conditions. “Moreover, the entrepreneur must be able to surround himself with a team that is more capable than himself.”

And he has some sage words of advice for the wannabe venture capitalist too. “The most important aspect of venture investing, compared to revenue stage investing, is the power of intuition.

“Like most decisions in life, which are subjective, most investments are based upon intuition and not analysis. It is more so for an early stage investment. Late-stage rounds or buyouts do need business analysis and number crunching, though.”