FigureAsia 35 Under 35 · Finance
Vasanth Sanoor Kamath
Age 34 · Investment technology and asset management · India
An investment-technology founder who turned model portfolios into widely used market infrastructure and helped build a large passive-fund platform.
- Age at the edition eligibility date
- 34
- Field
- Finance
- Country or region
- India
- FigureAsia U35 Assessment
- 87.0 / 100
Profile
Career and documented record
Vasanth Sanoor Kamath founded smallcase around a simple change in investment distribution: investors could buy and track transparent baskets of securities rather than enter a pooled fund without seeing the underlying portfolio in real time. The product became infrastructure used by brokers, advisers and asset managers. By FY25, smallcase had crossed ₹106 crore in revenue, approximately 50% growth, with more than ten million users and roughly ₹1.2 lakh crore in cumulative transactions reported through the platform.
Kamath's role spans the functions that produced that growth. A formal corporate record identifies him as head of business, growth, finance, human resources and investor relations at smallcase, in addition to his founder-and-chief-executive position. The wider platform also acquired institutional weight: a global asset manager formed a strategic relationship with smallcase, describing more than US$16 billion transacted since inception, and Zerodha Fund House, the smallcase–Zerodha joint venture, crossed ₹10,000 crore in assets under management and 800,000 investors in November 2025.
FigureAsia selection
Why Vasanth Sanoor Kamath is on the list
FigureAsia selected Kamath for building a product category and carrying it into repeatable financial infrastructure. The case does not rest on a 2025 funding round. It rests on completed operating growth, measured usage, an asset-management joint venture with significant AUM and a strategic distribution relationship that links Indian investors with a global institution.
The recognition remains careful about attribution and evidence. User, transaction and AUM figures are platform or partner measures, and investment outcomes depend on portfolio managers, brokers and market conditions as well as technology. Kamath is recognised for creating and running the delivery system, not for claiming the performance of every portfolio distributed through it.
Verified work
The 2025–26 record
Crossed ₹100 crore in annual revenue
smallcase reported FY25 revenue above ₹106 crore, roughly 50% growth, alongside more than ten million users and approximately ₹1.2 lakh crore in cumulative transactions.
Asset-management joint venture passed ₹10,000 crore
Zerodha Fund House, created by smallcase and Zerodha, crossed ₹10,000 crore in assets under management and 800,000 investors.
Field context
The work in its field
Investment platforms increasingly sit between regulated products, market intermediaries and retail investors. Their value is not merely interface design: they shape discovery, execution, portfolio maintenance, disclosure and the incentives governing which strategies reach customers.
Model portfolios can improve transparency and personal control, but they can also encourage performance chasing or blur the line between publishing a strategy and providing advice. The strongest operators are therefore those who combine scale with clear product architecture, accountable distribution and regulated asset-management capability.
FigureAsia U35 Assessment
Assessment breakdown
87.0out of 100
Completed financial consequence
27 / 30
Crossed ₹100 crore in annual revenue is treated as a delivered financial outcome. The score is confined to the completed result described in the record and excludes projections or paper valuation.
Individual agency and execution
22 / 25
The documented role—Founder and Chief Executive Officer—and the attributed actions in the profile establish accountable execution. Institution-wide results are not assigned to the person alone.
Verified reach and significance
17 / 20
Investment platforms increasingly sit between regulated products, market intermediaries and retail investors. Their value is not merely interface design: they shape discovery, execution, portfolio maintenance, disclosure and the incentives governing which strategies reach customers.
Innovation and field influence
13 / 15
The record combines investment technology and asset management with the completed work described in Asset-management joint venture passed ₹10,000 crore. Credit reflects demonstrated practice, not a claim of novelty by itself.
Stewardship, access and Asian relevance
8 / 10
The Asian connection is explicit: An Indian founder who built a Bengaluru investment-technology platform and an Indian asset-management joint venture with distribution and institutional links extending beyond India. Stewardship credit is limited to the regulatory, governance, access or stakeholder evidence described in the profile.