Campus Fund

Check the eligibility gate before anything else

Campus Fund's gate is narrower than most early-stage funds and it is a hard filter, not a preference. You need to be a current student, or to have left campus - by graduating or dropping out - within the last three years. You also need to already hold at least twenty-five per cent of the company. If you have diluted below that, or if you left campus more than three years ago, the general fund route is closed to you however good the business is.

Note that the fund gate and the Grand Challenge gate are worded differently. The fund says "within the last three years"; the Grand Challenge says "a current student, dropout or graduate from 2023 onwards". If you sit between the two, the competition is the wider door.

Pick the right door

There are two ways in and they are not the same thing.

• The always-open application form, linked from Apply Now on the home page. No deadline, no fee. This is the route if you want an investment conversation now.
• The Grand Challenge, which runs once a year. Free to enter, open to founders from any college or city in India, and it ends in a live pitch in Mumbai. This is the route if you want visibility, a jury of well-known investors and operators, and a shot at being discovered rather than a cheque today.

You do not have to choose one forever - past Grand Challenge winners appear in the portfolio.

What the process looks like

The fund publishes its own funnel: an elevator pitch, a first meeting, a second meeting, then the investment committee, and it says it moves from that first pitch to committee in twenty-one days. Treat that as the rhythm to prepare for. Have a short, sharp opening pitch that works cold, and be ready for two substantive meetings in quick succession rather than a long drip of emails.

For the Grand Challenge the shape is different: apply, then a top fifteen announced about a month later, then a live pitch to the jury at the finale. If you get through, travel and accommodation are covered for finalists coming in from outside Mumbai.

What reviewers appear to look for

The fund's own language is about the founder more than the deck. It talks about backing people who are "just getting started", about being the first institutional believer, and about staying on for the next round. The portfolio is tagged by campus and skews toward technical and research-heavy work - space, materials, diagnostics, devices, developer tooling - alongside consumer businesses. Solo founders are explicitly welcome, and for a team it is enough that one eligible founder clears the twenty-five per cent bar.

Being outside India is not a bar. The portfolio includes teams from Harvard, MIT, Wharton, Dartmouth, LSE, Kellogg, the Technical University of Munich and UAE University, and in September 2026 the fund said it was actively looking for founders who studied abroad and want to build from India.

Practical notes

• Applying is free for both routes.
• The equity requirement is a stake you must already own, not one the fund takes from you.
• The Grand Challenge deadline is published on its page each year; the 2026 edition closes in October 2026.
• General queries go to team@yourcampusfund.com. There is no published phone number.

Campus Fund is a venture capital fund in Bengaluru that invests only in startups founded by students, recent graduates and college dropouts. It describes itself as India's first and only SEBI-registered Category II fund investing exclusively in student-led startups. The fund is registered as a Category II Alternative Investment Fund, operates through its trustee MITCON Credentia Trusteeship Services Limited, and is managed by Sach Advisors Private Limited; a second vehicle, Campus Angel Fund, is registered as a Category I Alternative Investment Fund - Angel Fund.

Who can apply

The eligibility gate is narrow, specific and published in full on the home page. To be funded you must be a current student "enrolled in a college or university - whether you're in undergrad, postgrad, or research, and actively building something impactful on the side", or a graduate or dropout who has "recently stepped out of campus life (Within the Last 3 Years) or chosen to take the leap early - and are now full-time on your startup journey". On top of that you must hold at least twenty-five per cent equity in the company you are building, which the fund words as "You're not just part of the idea" - you have to be the one running it.

Two details are worth reading carefully. The three-year window runs from when you left campus, not from a fixed year, so it moves. And the twenty-five per cent floor is a stake you must already own, not a stake the fund takes.

The fund states no sector restriction and no restriction on which campus you came from. Its portfolio is tagged by the institution each founding team came out of, and that list runs from IIT Bombay, IIT Madras, IIT Delhi, IIT Kharagpur, IIT Roorkee, IISc, VIT, Manipal, SRM, BITS Pilani, Delhi University, NID, ISB and IIM Ahmedabad through to Harvard, MIT, Wharton, Dartmouth, the London School of Economics, Kellogg, the Technical University of Munich and UAE University.

How to apply

There is one always-open route in, and it is a real one rather than an email address: an Apply Now button on the home page opens the fund's own application form. There is no stated deadline and no fee. The fund also publishes the contact address team@yourcampusfund.com in its footer.

Campus Fund publishes its process as a funnel with four steps - elevator pitch, first meeting, second meeting, investment committee - ending in an investment, and it commits to a timeline alongside that funnel: from elevator pitch to investment committee in twenty-one days. The steps are printed inside a graphic on the home page rather than as text, so a screen reader will not read them out.

In September 2026 the fund announced an initiative called Build In India, aimed at students, recent graduates and dropouts anywhere in the world who choose to build their startup from India. News reports at the time said it is not a separate vehicle but a commitment within the fund's third fund, that cheques would go to founders regardless of university, educational background, nationality or sector, and that applications would be taken on a rolling basis with no deadline. The fund's own site links to that coverage but has no page describing the initiative, so the general application form remains the only published route to it.

The Grand Challenge

The Grand Challenge is Campus Fund's annual competition for student startups and is the one recurring programme it runs. The 2026 edition is the seventh, applications close in October 2026, the top fifteen are announced in November, and the grand finale is held in Mumbai in December, with travel and accommodation covered for finalists travelling in from outside the city. Entry is free, solo founders may apply, teams may apply provided at least one eligible founder holds twenty-five per cent or more, and undergraduate, postgraduate and PhD founders are all eligible.

Its eligibility is worded slightly differently from the fund's own gate: a current student, dropout or graduate from 2023 onwards. On the date this page was checked that was a wider window than the fund's rolling three years, so read both.

The competition publishes a leaderboard of the top three from every edition since 2020, which is unusually transparent for a programme of this kind. Recent winners are Novyte Materials from the Institute of Chemical Technology, Cosma Therapeutics from Delhi University and Rhygen from IIT Bombay in 2025; NCF Labs from IIT Bombay, Poccet Labs from AIIMS Delhi and Kuberns from VIT in 2024; and Treacle Tech from IIT Kanpur, Plenome from IIT Madras and Quickreel from DTU in 2023. Earlier editions named Paradyes, Perkant Tech and Gud Gum in 2022, Zeuron, Li-Circle and Nyus in 2021, and q Zense Labs, Workduck and Digantara in 2020.

The Grand Challenge page also lists more than forty named jurors with the editions they judged, among them Bharat Shah of HDFC Bank, Phanindra Sama of redBus, Sriharsha Majety of Swiggy, Vidit Aatrey of Meesho, Sanjeev Bikhchandani of Info Edge, Varun Alagh of Mamaearth, Anjali Bansal of Avaana Capital, Sasha Mirchandani of Kae Capital, Dev Khare of Lightspeed and Yatin Shah of 360One.

The portfolio

The portfolio page shows thirty-four companies, twenty-five of them named and nine held back as undisclosed. Named companies include Digantara and EtherealX in space, Sarla Aviation in mobility, D-Nome and Raaz in health, Green Grahi in agri, Zeuron.ai, Banza, Formi, We360, CTRL B, Bidaal and ParkSmart in software, Sama in dispute resolution, Expand My Business and Digital Labour Chowk in marketplaces, and Gramiyaa, Mumbai Pav Co., Dr. Doodley, Emote, Plutus, Bharat Sure, Sortizy, Human Biogenesis and Raho Hospitalities across consumer and fintech.

Who runs it

Campus Fund was founded by Richa Bajpai, who is its Founder and CEO. She earlier co-founded Goodera and, before that, a renewable energy startup she started from her dorm room, has served on the investment committee of The Creator Fund in the UK and Europe, holds an MBA from London Business School, and has been named in Forbes 30 Under 30 India and Asia, MIT Innovators Under 35 India, and as a World Economic Forum Young Global Leader.

Bharat Shah, a co-founder of HDFC Bank, is Chief Advisor. Dr Howard L. Morgan, chair and general partner at B Capital, co-founder of First Round Capital and the person who launched the Dorm Room Fund in the United States in 2012, is Global Advisor. The directors are Bijou Kurien, Kartik H, Michelle Paisley, Phanindra Sama and Srivathsala KN. The investment and operating team is small and several of its members came through campuses themselves - one joined as a fellow while still in college and was promoted to associate the following year.

Where it is

The fund works out of a WeWork at Prestige Cube on Hosur Road in Adugodi, Koramangala, Bengaluru. It publishes no phone number, no careers page and no events page; the site is four pages, and the application form is the way in.