KUALA LUMPUR (23 November 2022)– Penjana Kapital is proud to share that the inaugural KapitalX programme, Malaysia’s first Junior Venture Capital (VC) talent development programme, had concluded on 23 November 2022. 32 participants have successfully completed the programme upon undergoing a 5-week classroom training and a 1-month venture fellowship with 14 venture capital management companies. The KapitalX programme is Penjana Kapital’s flagship talent development programme established to develop venture capital talents with the competencies to be world-class investors.

Launched in April 2022, the inaugural KapitalX programme gathered a cohort of university students in their penultimate year, recent graduates with less than two years of experience and entrepreneurs or early-stage startup employees.

In the past three months, participants went through more than 25 hours of workshops delivered by VC partners on topics such as deal sourcing, due diligence, legal know-how, valuation and many more. This was followed by a one-month venture fellowship where participants committed over 5 hours a week to get hands-on experience working in and learning about the day-to-day running of a typical VC firm.

Taufiq Iskandar, Chief Executive Officer of Penjana Kapital, further echoed the Ministry of Finance’s vision by saying “Venture Capital talent is key to a robust startup and private market ecosystem. Since the establishment of Penjana Kapital, we have attracted local and foreign fund managers to set up their operations here which translated to the need of having young talent to support their fund operations. We hope the alumni of this programme will continue their career path in venture capital and be part of the growing VC industry in Malaysia and KapitalX program to be a key source of validated VC talent”.

After the KapitalX programme, the VC partners can extend the fellowship period with the participants or offer any career opportunities.

“Coming from an industry that is always starving for talent, it was a breath of fresh air to work with KapitalX. Their wholistic approach to educating and onboarding people to the VC/PE industry is a powerful tool in solving the HR gap. We found that participants were able to get a broad foundation of knowledge that we could then easily build upon. We ultimately ended up hiring two KapitalX participants to the team on a full-time basis and would gladly take on more going forward” said Erman Akinci, Managing Director & Founder of Emissary Capital.

“KapitalX has definitely been a life-changing experience and I am glad to have taken that first step in the VC industry! Through my experience in SOSV, Navin has been patient and kind to guide and nurture my understanding of the VC ecosystem, from learning to analyse startups, conducting deal sourcing to connecting with founders. I am grateful for this experience and look forward to growing in this space!” said Jessica Ngan Keh Jinn, a graduate of KapitalX programme.

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