A graduate of Stanford and Harvard universities, the Indian American VC said Amplo’s goal is to concentrate on young entrepreneurs who can solve “real problems.”
Indian American Sheel Tyle, who founded venture capital firm Amplo in 2017, will lead the $100 million fund for seed and follow-on deals related to startup Andela, Forbes reported.
Former NEA investor, Tyle has been on Andela’s board since 2014. “That Amplo was able to join a who’s who cast of venture firms in backing Andela – African fund CRE Venture Capital led the round in the largest ever between an African firm and startup, joining Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, GV, Salesforce Ventures and Spark Capital – is less of a surprise given Tyle’s background with the company,” the report said. “Tyle’s served for several years as an independent board member at Andela CEO Jeremy Johnson’s request. Tyle’s joined by a new independent board member, former Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard, who has her own ties to Amplo.”
The website said Tyle refused to discuss the funding matter with them due to SEC regulations.
After his second term at the venture capital firm NEA, Tyle quit the company and started Amplo earlier this year in May. Born to Indian parents, the young business leader graduated from Stanford when he was just 19 and thereafter worked at Skybox Imaging. After Google acquired Skybox Imaging, Tyle joined Bessemer Venture Partners.
“He helped source Snapdeal, the Indian ecommerce giant, and then Robinhood for NEA, the firm he worked at after Bessemer and rejoined partway through joint advanced law and business degrees at Harvard,” the report said. “ Tyle also invested personally in those companies, Andela and Mark43, appearing on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list in 2012.”
Although Tyle did not discuss the financial details of the fund due to regulations, he told Forbes that Amplo’s goal is to concentrate on young entrepreneurs who can solve “real problems.” “Founders who want to change something about how the world works tend to build bigger companies,” he said.