Risk capital firm Helion Venture Partners is leading a third round of investment in quick service restaurant chain Mast Kalandar, which is run by Bangalore-based Spring Leaf Retail.
Helion, along with another existing investor Footprint Ventures, will put in $6 million (about Rs 32.5 crore) into the ethnic Indian food chain that has now raised a total of $11 million in equity capital.
This investment follows a spate of venture deals in the quick service food sector that has gained prominence since the successful listing of Jubilant FoodWorksBSE 0.47 %, the master franchise for Domino's Pizza in India, and of Speciality Restaurants, which runs restaurants like Mainland China.
Slightly mature food and beverage start-ups will be valued at a range of 2 to 2.5 times revenue, said Kanwaljit Singh, senior managing director of Helion which has pumped in $5 million in this round of investment.
Singh said international players have managed to take an early lead in the quick service restaurant category in the country. "But regionally we are seeing a number of Indian players now emerging and they are starting to create a national footprint."
Indian QSR chains have been slow in scaling up. Investor-turned-entrepreneur Kiran Nadkarni's eight-year-old venture Kaati Zone became profitable only early this year.