ASK Indian Entrepreneur (IEP)

Investment Philosophy

ASK’s Indian Entrepreneur Portfolio (IEP) focuses on businesses led by Indian entrepreneurs with meaningful skin in the game, reflected through high promoter ownership. The strategy seeks promoters who demonstrate strong governance standards, clear long-term vision, disciplined execution, and prudent capital allocation and distribution. Within this universe, the portfolio targets high-quality businesses with strong and sustainable earnings growth, sizeable growth runways, and limited reliance on capital dilution. The philosophy follows ASK’s proven GARP (Growth at the Right Price) approach, applied specifically to promoter-driven businesses.

Core Investment Attributes

• Size of Opportunity: Assessment of the opportunity size relative to the company’s scale, including market dominance, resilience, and liquidity.
• Business Quality: Preference for high-quality businesses with superior ROCE, durable competitive moats, and long-term sustainability.
• Earnings Growth: Focus on the quantum, consistency, durability, and compounding potential of earnings growth, with emphasis on growth without capital dilution.
• Valuation Discipline: Investments made with a favourable price–value gap and an adequate margin of safety.
• Management Quality: High standards of promoter integrity, vision, execution capability, and capital allocation treated as a constant requirement.

Investment Process

• Initial Universe: Start with the top 500 companies by market capitalisation.
• Promoter Ownership Filter: Narrow to ~306 companies with promoter or family ownership exceeding 25%.
• Profitability Screen: Further filter to ~210 companies with trailing profit before tax of at least ₹100 crore.
• Qualitative Assessment: Subjective evaluation of management quality, vision, capital allocation track record, historical execution, and corporate governance standards, reducing the universe to ~123 companies.
• Capital Efficiency Filter: Screening to ~59 companies with minimum ROCE of 25%.
• Final Portfolio Construction: Selection of ~20 companies based on earnings growth visibility of 20–25% over the next 3–5 years without capital dilution and a margin of safety of at least 20% to intrinsic value.

PMS Background

ASK is one of the oldest and largest PMS houses in India, having commenced operations in 1983 under the leadership of Asit Koticha. The firm has a singular focus on discretionary listed Indian equity mandates and places strong emphasis on mindset and philosophy alignment with clients. Over the years, ASK has built a reputation for disciplined execution, supported by a stable, in-house research team and a clearly defined investment process. Fund managers are typically groomed internally, ensuring continuity and consistency in philosophy and decision-making.

Investment Philosophy

The investment philosophy is anchored in a FOCUS-driven framework designed to identify high-quality businesses capable of generating sustainable long-term wealth across market cycles. The approach combines fundamental analysis, assessment of structural growth opportunities, cycle awareness, competitive strength, and valuation discipline to deliver consistent, risk-adjusted outcomes while protecting capital.

• Fundamentals: Emphasis on strong balance sheets, healthy cash flows, and consistent profitability. Focus on business quality, resilience across cycles, and disciplined capital allocation, with priority given to sustainability of returns rather than short-term earnings volatility.
• Opportunity Size & Scalability: Preference for businesses operating in large and expanding opportunity sets, supported by structural growth tailwinds and favourable industry dynamics. Focus on scalability and long-term demand visibility without excessive reliance on leverage.
• Cycles & Capital Allocation: Recognition that both markets and businesses move through cycles. Active evaluation of cycle positioning, with emphasis on management prudence during upcycles and discipline during downturns. Willingness to invest in cyclical recoveries or structural improvements where risk–reward is favourable.
• Unmatched Moats: Focus on companies with durable competitive advantages such as brand leadership, economies of scale, network effects, technology edge, or regulatory protection. Strong moats support pricing power, margin stability, and resilience to competitive disruption.
• Margin of Safety & Stewardship: Embedded risk management through valuation discipline and governance standards. Investments are made at reasonable valuations relative to intrinsic value, with strong emphasis on ethical leadership, shareholder alignment, and long-term stewardship to preserve capital while retaining upside.

In essence, the FOCUS framework integrates quality, growth, cycle awareness, competitive strength, and valuation discipline into a cohesive investment approach. By remaining anchored to business fundamentals and long-term value creation, the philosophy seeks to deliver consistent wealth creation while minimising the risk of permanent capital impairment.

Suitable For

Investors seeking exposure to high-quality businesses with an emphasis on consistency, capital protection, and long-term compounding rather than aggressive return maximisation.