Niyaz Laiq

Partner

With over 16 years of experience as an investor, entrepreneur, and operator across India’s dynamic content, community, and commerce ecosystems, Niyaz brings a unique blend of early-stage venture expertise, founder empathy, and deep India insight that aligns seamlessly with Lumikai’s mission to back the next generation of interactive media and gaming companies.

Niyaz was most recently a Partner at GSF, India’s pioneering seed investing platform with portfolio FMV of $3Bn and 10x MOIC across 110 companies, where he led 20 early-stage investments across consumer and enterprise tech between 2021–2024. At GSF, he also spearheaded the GSF Founders Academy, the country’s largest accelerator program, nurturing bi-annual cohorts of ambitious entrepreneurs and building strong founder communities.

Niyaz began his investing career at Federated Hermes Private Equity (committed capital of $12Bn) in London and Singapore, managing private equity fund commitments and direct co-investments across Asia, including India, from 2008–2012. His early exposure to top-tier Indian fund managers provided him with an institutional foundation in investing, with over $1Bn of capital deployed/managed by him. He returned to India to join Lok Capital, a leading impact-focused VC managing over $500M, further deepening his local market knowledge and networks, including investments in MAS and Suryoday, which exited via IPO.

As a founder, Niyaz built and scaled BetterButter, India’s largest UGC-driven recipe-sharing platform at its peak, bringing together community and commerce in a way that mirrored Lumikai’s belief in culturally resonant content platforms. With over 10 million monthly views, content in 7 Indian languages, and 10,000+ recipes added monthly, BetterButter tapped into India's vast digital user base and was acquired by Silverpush in 2019.
Post-exit, Niyaz joined Bulbul, India's first live-video commerce startup, which raised $25M from Sequoia and other marquee investors where he helped scale the business from the ground up. He led the creation of three core verticals: live streaming, in-house content production, and an influencer-driven product review network. The company later exited to The Good Glamm Group.

Niyaz holds a Bachelor’s in Economics from Delhi University and a Master’s in Finance & Development from SOAS, University of London. Growing up on AoE and SimCity, Niyaz can be found on the weekends at the park going through podcasts (reccos: In Good Company, The Rest is Politics, Empire) or browsing through the OTTs (deciding what to watch more than watching).