Meet Shruti Gandhi, who launched Array Ventures in 2016; 8 years later, her first fund had returned all it

Shruti Gandhi launched Array Ventures in 2016 to back early-stage technology companies, with a focus on enterprise technology, data and software. The firm concentrates on newly formed data and artificial intelligence companies, working with founders while they develop products, find customers and build a path to growth. According to The Economic Times, Gandhi announced in a year-end update in February 2025 that the firm had fully returned its 2016 Fund I by the first quarter of 2024. The announcement came at a time when venture capital investors were facing difficulty turning startup investments into cash, and the firm said it had distributed capital to investors every year for the previous five years.

Gandhi began her career as a software engineer at IBM before moving into venture capital. She worked with Samsung's early-stage investment arm before joining True Ventures, and later founded Array Ventures.

The firm continued to invest while reporting the milestone. In 2024, Array Ventures invested in seven companies, leading five of those investments, and made six additional investments in existing portfolio companies. The firm highlighted several portfolio companies that raised further funding during the year: Rad AI secured funding from Khosla Ventures and Transformation Capital, HappyRobot raised a Series A round from Andreessen Horowitz, Openprise raised a Series B round from Morgan Stanley, and Placer.ai raised a Series C round.

The announcement placed the full return of the first fund alongside ongoing deployment of capital into new opportunities, showing the firm returning capital to Fund I investors while continuing to invest from later vehicles. The source does not disclose the fund size or the return multiple.