Corporate investors Country Garden, New World Group and Ping An co-led a series B round of undisclosed size for China-based semiconductor technology producer Biren Technology on Tuesday, taking its total funding to RMB4.7bn ($715m).
Bertelsmann Asia Investments (BAI), an investment vehicle for media group Bertelsmann, also took part, as did China Growth Capital, China Merchants Capital, IDG Capital, MSA Capital, Citic Securities Investment and Greater Bay Area Homeland Investments.
The round was filled out by Shanghai Guosheng Group’s Shanghai Strategy Fund, Source Code Capital, China V Fund and Zhuhai Da Heng Qin Group. Country Garden was represented by Country Garden Venture Capital while fellow real estate developer New World Group and insurer Ping An invested directly.
Biren is working on general-purpose computing systems, covering hardware, such as chips, in addition to cloud software development. It intends to additionally focus on artificial intelligence reasoning and graphics rendering.
Hedge fund manager Hillhouse Capital’s GL Ventures unit led a pre-series B round of undisclosed size for Biren in August 2020 that included construction firm Zhuhai Da Heng Qin and Haier Capital, the investment arm of appliance producer Haier, increasing its overall funding to approximately $288m.
The August round also featured China V Fund, Co-Stone Asset Management, Gaorong Capital, GP Hi-Tech Capital, IDG Capital, Pine Capital and Sky9 Capital, and it followed an undisclosed sum provided by China Fortune-Tech Capital in July.
The company had completed a $155m series A round in June 2020 co-led by IDG Capital, Qiming Venture Partners and Walden International and backed by appliance manufacturer Gree, CCI Holdings, China Development Bank Capital, China V Fund, Glory Ventures, Meridian Capital and Pine Capital.
