Black Lake, a China-based manufacturing software developer, has raised almost RMB500m ($77.3m) in a series C round featuring Bertelsmann Asia Investments, a corporate venturing unit for media conglomerate Bertelsmann.
Singaporean state-owned investment firm Temasek co-led the round with investment bank China Renaissance and venture capital firm Lightspeed Venture Partners, while GGV Capital, GSR Ventures, ZhenFund and all of Black Lake’s existing investors also participated in the round.
Black Lake has created cloud software used by manufacturing companies to manage and analyse their production data. The platform produces reports showing abnormalities in the production process and opportunities to increase output.
The company has claimed the software is used by nearly 2,000 manufacturing companies located in China and Southeast Asia. The capital injection will go toward product development, recruitment and market expansion activities.
The funding will also be used to build a platform for third-party developers, and the company has now raised over $100m since it was founded in 2016.
Bertelsmann Asia Investments and GSR Ventures co-led a $22.1m series B round for Black Lake in May 2019 that was also backed by GGV Capital and ZhenFund.
The company secured approximately $7.8m from unnamed investors in a 2018 series A round, after raising $1.4m in a series A round including GGV Capital in 2017. ZhenFund, IDG Capital and China Growth Capital had invested $1m in Black Lake the previous year.