V3 Ventures: Verlinvest-backed consumer fund deploying Rs 250-300 crore a year in India

V3 Ventures is an early-stage venture capital firm backed by Belgium-based, family-owned investment group Verlinvest, co-founded in 2021 by Lopo Champalimaud (founder of Treatwell) alongside Arjun Vaidya (founder of Dr Vaidya's). With a EUR 100 million corpus across India, Europe and the US — roughly 30% earmarked for India — the firm is deploying Rs 250–300 crore annually in India (per the Financial Express, April 2026), with India operations led from Mumbai.

Investment thesis

V3's thesis is founder-led consumer investing: back the consumer brands of tomorrow across wellness and beauty, food and drinks and lifestyle — businesses building communities of fanatical customers. The Verlinvest backing gives portfolio founders access to a global consumer-brand network and brand experts, a genuine edge in a D2C market where distribution and brand-building decide winners.

Sectors, stages and cheque sizes

The firm invests at seed, pre-Series A and Series A across wellness and beauty (skincare, bodycare, haircare, fragrances, health supplements, digital health), food and drinks (better-for-you, functional foods and drinks, alternative proteins), lifestyle (travel, pet care, creator economy, hospitality, sports, entertainment, home and living), plus consumer technology and commerce enablers. Reported cheque sizes: USD 2–5 million in seed/Series A rounds (YourStory), with pre-seed cheques of Rs 2.5–4 crore in niche beauty and personal care (Financial Express).

Notable portfolio

Portfolio names include Kuku FM, Eka Care, SuperYou, Earthful, Go Zero and Ugaoo.

People

Lopo Champalimaud (London) and Arjun Vaidya (Mumbai) are Co-founders and Investment Partners, with Abhiram Bhalerao as Partner (India), Shweta Tripathi as Investor (India) and Matt Chandler as Partner (London).

Programs and founder support

Arjun Vaidya runs "Direct to a Billion Consumers" — a podcast and cohort-based D2C brand-building course for Indian founders — and portfolio companies get access to Verlinvest's global consumer-brand expert network. No formal credits or perks programme is publicly documented.

How to engage

V3's consumer-only focus means the pitch lives or dies on brand and community metrics — repeat purchase rates, community engagement, organic traction — rather than just GMV. The USD 2–5 million seed/Series A cheques (and Rs 2.5–4 crore pre-seed in beauty) fit D2C brands ready to scale distribution. Founders should study Arjun Vaidya's Direct to a Billion Consumers content before engaging; it reveals exactly how the partners think about brand-building. The Verlinvest network is the hidden asset — founders with global ambitions should ask how portfolio companies have used it, because that access is the firm's structural edge.