Varun Dalal is a venture capital investor with a strong focus on early-stage companies in the mobile and media industries. He started his career in finance and is a qualified chartered accountant. Since 2012 Dalal has served as Principal of Telegraph Hill Capital in Barcelona, Spain. His industry experience includes information technology, telecommunication, BPOs, media, healthcare, electronics, engineering products and infrastructure.

Brief History

Early in his career, Varun Dalal worked for KPMG India. He started at the Gurgaon, India branch as article trainee to a senior auditor, a role he held for nearly five years. Dalal was then promoted to being the assistant manager of the transaction services department in Delhi, India. He worked in this role for just over four years and was responsible for financial analysis and advisory services. Dalal relocated to Barcelona, Spain and in June 2012 he started the role of principal at Telegraph Hill Capital. Here Dalal identifies and evaluates potential investment opportunities in Europe and the United States with a particular focus on mobile and media industries. In June 2012 Dalal also joined IESE Business School where he was responsible for research and case writing of real-life private equity transactions. As part of the EURO 500 Project, he researched and contacted high growth companies for the European Growth Summit and Award Ceremony, an initiative geared to recognise the top European entrepreneurs in terms of growth.

Location

Varun Dalal is originally from India. After completing his basic education, Dalal enrolled at the Shri Ram College of Commerce where he achieved a bachelor’s of commerce degree in accounting in 2002. During his time at the college, Dalal was actively involved in his memberships of the English Club, the Commerce Club, and the College Students Union. From 2004 to 2006 he was enrolled at The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India where he studied accounting and finance and became certified as a chartered accountant. After relocating to Barcelona in Spain Dalal enrolled at Instituto de Estudios Superiores de Empresa (IESE) Business School, the University of Navarra where he attained an MBA in 2013. Dalal speaks English, Hindi and Spanish.

Remarkable Investments

In 2013 Varun Dalal made a seed round investment in Apptopia, a company that provides services in data mining, app analytics and business intelligence for the mobile industry. The total funding amount raised was US$8.2 million. In total Dalal has made 18 major investments with two successful exits during the years he has spent with Telegraph Hill Capital. Active investments as in October 2018 include: Oonair, Ringadoc (acquired by Practice Fusion), The Bouq, ME911, NewHound, Chronogolf, Captio, Chewse and Bison. 

Latest News

It was reported that in 2016, Varun Dalal was selected to serve as a judge of the Europe South (IESE) for the UNC Kenan-Flagler Venture Capital Investment Competition. Dalal was selected because of over a decade of experience working in assurance and M&A advisory services. The investor was responsible for several cross-border transactions between Europe and the United States.