Parag Saxena (

Hindi Modern Standard Hindi (, ), commonly referred to as Hindi, is the Standard language, standardised variety of the Hindustani language written in the Devanagari script. It is an official language of India, official language of the Government ...

: पराग सक्सेना; born April 27, 1955) is an Indian-American

investment manager Investment management (sometimes referred to more generally as financial asset management) is the professional asset management of various securities, including shareholdings, bonds, and other assets, such as real estate, to meet specified inve ...

who is the co-founder and general partner of Vedanta Capital. He had previously founded Invesco Private Capital, a subsidiary of

Invesco Invesco Ltd. is an American independent investment management company headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, with branch offices in 20 countries. Its common stock is a constituent of the S&P 500 and trades on the New York Stock Exchange. Invesco oper ...

. He also co-founded and is CEO of

New Silk Route New Silk Route Partners LLC (NSR) is an Indian private equity firm that invests in private companies in India, Asia, and the Middle East. History In early 2006, Parag Saxena, Rajat Gupta, and Raj Rajaratnam joined Mark Schwartz, the former c ...

, an Asia-focused venture capital firm.

Early life and education

Saxena earned a

B.Tech A Bachelor of Technology (BTech) is an undergraduate degree that is awarded for a higher education program in engineering. Countries Australia In Australia, the Bachelor of Technology degree is offered by RMIT University, Edith Cowan Unive ...

from the

Indian Institute of Technology The Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) are a network of engineering and technology institutions in India. Established in 1950, they are under the purview of the Ministry of Education of the Indian Government and are governed by the Instit ...

, an

M.S. A Master of Science (; abbreviated MS, M.S., MSc, M.Sc., SM, S.M., ScM or Sc.M.) is a master's degree. In contrast to the Master of Arts degree, the Master of Science degree is typically granted for studies in sciences, engineering and medicine ...

Chemical Engineering Chemical engineering is an engineering field which deals with the study of the operation and design of chemical plants as well as methods of improving production. Chemical engineers develop economical commercial processes to convert raw materials ...

from the West Virginia College of Graduate Studies and an

M.B.A. A Master of Business Administration (MBA) is a professional degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration; elective courses may allow further study in a particular a ...

from the

Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania The Wharton School ( ) is the business school of the University of Pennsylvania, a private Ivy League research university in Philadelphia. Established in 1881 through a donation from Joseph Wharton, a co-founder of Bethlehem Steel, the Wharton ...

Career

Saxena started his career at Becton Dickinson as a product manager in 1978. He joined Citicorp Investment Management in 1983; the company became Chancellor Capital Management in 1988.

acquired the company in 1998, and Saxena became the managing partner and founder of Invesco Private Capital, a subsidiary of

. Over the course of four years, he was on ''Forbes''

Midas List The ''Forbes'' Midas list is the annual ranking by ''Forbes'' magazine of the most influential and best-performing venture capital investors. Described by Kara Swisher as the "Oscars for venture capitalists in tech," the Midas List uses parameters ...

. He spent 23 years at Invesco Private Capital. He stepped down as managing partner of Invesco Private Capital in April 2006, with the ''New York Times'' noting many investors had been leaving the company, and quoting him as noting that conflict among management and lawsuits against Invesco had made it increasingly hard to raise funds. In May 2006, Saxena launched the New York-based diversified venture capital firm Vedanta, along with former Invesco executives Alessandro Piol and Howard Goldstein. In 2007, a $275-million

collateralized fund obligation A collateralized fund obligation (CFO) is a form of securitization involving private equity fund or hedge fund assets, similar to collateralized debt obligations. CFOs are a structured form of financing for diversified private equity portfolios, ...

(CFO), originally founded in 2004, was acquired from Invesco by Vedanta, making Vedanta a

spin-out A corporate spin-off, also known as a spin-out, starburst or hive-off, is a type of corporate action where a company "splits off" a section as a separate business or creates a second incarnation, even if the first is still active. It is distinct ...

of Invesco. In 2006, he co-founded

, an Asia-focused venture capital firm, with

Rajat Gupta Rajat Kumar Gupta (; born ) is an Indian-American business executive who, as CEO, was the first foreign-born managing director of management consultancy firm McKinsey & Company from 1994 to 2003. In 2012, he was convicted of insider trading and ...

and

Raj Rajaratnam Rajakumaran Rajaratnam (born June 15, 1957) is a Sri Lankan-American former hedge fund manager and founder of the Galleon Group, a New York-based hedge fund management firm. He is also the author of his memoir, '' Uneven Justice: The Plot to S ...

, as well as Mark Schwartz, a Goldman Sachs veteran who left New Silk Route in 2008. Saxena is CEO of the company. The fund closed to investors in late 2008. Gupta filed a lawsuit against Saxena in 2013, alleging Saxena in 2012 started limiting his access to New Silk Route after Gupta had been sentenced in 2012 for securities fraud; the lawsuit was dismissed by a judge in 2013 for being irrelevant.

Personal life

Saxena is married to Usha Saxena, and they have several children together. In 2022 the couple gave $10 million to

Brown University Brown University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. It is the List of colonial colleges, seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the US, founded in 1764 as the ' ...

to expand the study of South Asia, and the university renamed its Center for Contemporary South Asia to the Saxena Center for Contemporary South Asia.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Saxena, Parag 1955 births Living people Businesspeople from Pune Private equity and venture capital investors Wharton School alumni IIT Bombay alumni