Impact investment firm Caspian is looking to nearly double its debt investments in startups to around ₹500 crore this fiscal year, with a key shift in focus towards ventures led or owned by women.

The Hyderabad-based investor, which currently has around ₹550 crore of funds available at its disposal, will also focus on ventures which provide products and services that are non-discretionary, like agri-business, clean energy, education, health and microlending, which are among the least impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Caspian’s new investments fell in the just-ended fiscal year to ₹344 crore, from ₹424 crore in 2019-20 and ₹392 crore the year before, with hardly five months of active operations amid the pandemic. Cumulatively, it has invested around ₹2,000 crore as debt in 154 firms.

“We have raised tier-II capital of ₹57 crore at the end of last year from US-based International Development Finance Corporation and we now have enough liquidity of around ₹550 crore, both impact debt and venture debt put together,” managing director S Viswanatha Prasad told ET.

Apart from looking to significantly increase debt investments during the current fiscal year, Caspian is also eying equity investments of around ₹75-100 crore in 3-4 ventures at an average of ₹25-30 crore each, mostly in financial services and clean energy segments. “This year, Caspian will put a significant push as a category towards lending to women-owned and women-managed businesses or businesses into products and services focusing on women,” Prasad said.

Its target is to make around 40% of new investment in such businesses, up from around 10-12% cumulative to date.

Learning from experiences during the Covid-19 pandemic, the impact investor has also decided to invest mostly in ventures whose fortunes are not dependent on discretionary spending.