[by Cerius Shah] While the consecutive sessions at Esummit 08 at IIT Powai were insightful, few, as expected, had a media focus.

The emerging entrepreneurial eco-system in India was moderated by Vinnie Vyas of Crossover.  Ajit Balakrishnan made comments on the absence of VC’s in early stage funding. Pointing to the fact that VC’s currently like to cluster their investments within a sector, like travel (co-incidentally Sandeep Murthy, Sherpalo Ventures, Cleartrip, was also on the same panel).

According to Balakrishanan, the capital markets in the US are set for a reversal and due to the fact that a vast majority of Indian VC funding is US based, many VC’s will likely exit the scene in 18 months. His solution? Let the vast repositories of funds in LIC and UTI be used as indigenous venture capital firms that can fuel innovation rather than rely heavily on foreign funding. Should we start opening up our indigenous coffers or let the markets decide what money was dumb or smart should Apocalypse ‘99 Redux arrive?