Kochhar & Co and AZB & Partners have advised venture capital firms New Enterprise Associates (NEA) and Headland Capital respectively on their Rs 70 crore equity investment in mobile value added services (VAS) provider ValueFirst Messaging.

The Bangalore office of Kochhar & Co, which is led by partner Stephen Mathias, acted for New Enterprise Associates and AZB Mumbai partner Ashwin Ramanathan advised Headland Capital.

This is the second round of funding received by ValueFirst, which hired a Delhi-based litigation partner for its legal work.

In August 2010 NEA had invested in Novatium Solutions together with telecoms company Ericsson that had instructed Linklaters in London.

“NEA, the global private equity fund with $11 billion in invested capital, which is being managed by ex-ICICI Venture fund honcho Bala Deshpande in India, has been getting pretty aggressive in the Indian market and was close to clinching a $50 million investment deal with Bangalore-based Tutorvista, before Pearson picked up majority stake. Deshpande is understood to have led two investments at inTarvo (a reverse logistics service provider) and Nova Medical Centre (a day care surgical chain), “ the Business Standard reported.