SoftBank Vision Fund elevates Sumer Juneja to managing partner position

Mumbai: SoftBank Vision Fund, which invests in technology companies globally, has elevated Sumer Juneja, who heads its India office, to the position of managing partner.

The development comes on the back of a record year of funding for Indian startups and at a time when the Japanese firm has deployed close to $3 billion in the country.

Juneja joined SoftBank in 2018 as partner and head of India and has since led investments in Swiggy, social commerce startup Meesho and others like edtech firm Eruditus. Before joining SoftBank, he was at Norwest Venture Partners where he was a director at the US-headquartered venture capital’s India office.


Juneja is credited for setting up an India team, diversifying the India portfolio for SoftBank beyond ecommerce and ride-hailing and backing startups in edtech, business-to-business, software-as-a-service and enterprise in what has been the busiest year for the group here.

SoftBank has also seen a few of its portfolio firms go public including PB Fintech, which runs Policybazaar and Paytm, which had a poor showing on its market debut.

Along with Juneja, SoftBank is also promoting Lydia Jett and Vikas Parekh, who are based in the US, and Dennis Chang in China to the managing partner level. Jett, who led SoftBank's investments in Flipkart both the times, is the first woman managing partner in the fund's investing team. She specialises in ecommerce with bets like South Korea’s Coupang under her belt.

These changes come amid a slew of departures in the senior ranks of SoftBank Vision Fund. Deep Nishar, a senior managing partner at the fund, left recently.