Funding
Syntiant, a US-based provider of edge artificial intelligence software, has completed a $55m funding round that included semiconductor manufacturer Renesas Electronics Corporation. The corporate participated alongside Millennium Technology Value Partners, Mirae Asset Capital and undisclosed new and existing investors.
4C Medical Technologies, a US-based developer of treatments for structural heart disease, closed a $35.4m series C round yesterday led by medical device producer MicroPort CardioFlow Medtech Corporation. The cash will support technology development and the expansion of 4C’s product pipeline.
Germany-based cross-chain composability technology startup Composable Finance secured $32m yesterday in a series A round featuring Coinbase Ventures, the investment arm of Coinbase, as well as fellow cryptocurrency exchange GSR. They participated alongside Tendermint Ventures, Fundamental Labs, LongHash Ventures, Figment VC, New Form Capital, Blockchain Capital, Yunt Capital, Jump Capital, Polytope Capital, NGC Ventures, SOSV and Spartan Group.
Lubricant producer SK Lubricants led a $28m series C round for US-based data-centre cooling technology provider Green Revolution Cooling (GRC) yesterday. The other participants were not identified but SK invested $25m, it said earlier this week.
Insurance and financial services firm Legal & General and oil and gas provider Equinor co-led the $20m first close of a series B round for UK-based robotics technology developer Vaarst today through subsidiaries Legal & General Capital and Equinor Ventures. The corporates were joined by Foresight Group and In-Q-Tel.
Investment firm MPower Partners helped ClipLine, the Japan-based provider of a business management support service, increase its series E round to ¥1.65bn ($13.6m) yesterday. It had raised a total of ¥1.05bn for the round as of last month, from internet company Digital Garage’s vehicle, financial services firms Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation and Yamaguchi Financial Group’s SMBC Venture Capital and Yamaguchi Capital vehicles and Aizawa Asset Management.
Japan-based digital marketing technology producer AIQ received ¥1.6bn ($13.1m) in equity and debt financing from investors including textile provider Toyoshima’s Fashion & Technology Fund 2, IT services firm TIS and financial services firm Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation’s SMBC Venture Capital unit yesterday. The round was filled out by JIC Venture Growth Investments and debt financing from Resona Bank.
E-commerce and financial technology producer Rakuten co-led a $10m series A round for Colombia-based digital cashback and rewards platform developer Leal yesterday through strategic investment arm Rakuten Capital. The round was co-led with investment fund IDC Ventures and the cash will go to expansion in Mexico and the launch of Leal’s co-branded credit card.
Liv, the US-headquartered operator of a livestreaming platform designed for virtual and augmented reality games, secured $8.5m in series A funding yesterday from investors including consumer electronics producer Sony’s Innovation Fund, e-commerce firm Amazon’s Alexa Fund and Samsung Next, a subsidiary of electronics manufacturer Samsung. The round was led by venture capital firm Bitkraft Ventures and also backed by Credo Ventures, Olive Tree Capital and individuals including Dave Wu.
Gradient Ventures, the artificial intelligence fund formed by internet technology provider Google, led workplace productivity tool developer Sona’s $6.8m seed round yesterday. Speedinvest and Invested also took part, as did angel investors Anthony Danon, Maximilian Bittner, Graham Paterson, Andrej-Nicolai Henkler, Sri Pangulur, Tom Blomfield, Andy Leaver, Lorenzo Franzi and unnamed partners from Novator Partners.
Crypto Raiders, the US-headquartered creator of a blockchain role-playing game, raised $6m on Wednesday in a funding round co-led by cryptocurrency research firm Delphi Digital and DeFiance Capital. It also featured metaverse game platform developer GuildFi, gaming guild Yield Guild Games, Merit Circle, Three Arrows Capital and undisclosed others.
Philippines-based online wealth management service Seedbox secured $6m on Wednesday from SBI Ventures Singapore, a subsidiary of financial services provider SBI, and Philippine Equity Partners. The company was formed as a joint venture between asset manager Atram Group and technology investment holding company Indivara.
Decentralised money market operator Burrow received $5m in funding on Wednesday from investors including Jump Crypto, a subsidiary of Jump Trading, as well as fellow trading firm Kronos Research, Dragonfly Capital, ParaFi Capital, Lemniscap, Mentha Partners, Warburg Serres Investments, QCP Capital, DeFi Capital, D1 Ventures, GFS Ventures, SevenX Ventures, IOSG Ventures, Move Capital and Metaweb Ventures.
Ingage, a Japan-based developer of customer service visualisation software, raised ¥580m ($4.8m) yesterday in the first tranche of a series D round that was led by Emellience Partners, a subsidiary of IT services group Biprogy (formerly known as Nihon Unisys). The round was backed by leasing services firm Chugin Lease, financial services firm Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation’s SMBC Venture Capital subsidiary, Dream Incubator’s Dimension fund and Seiho Investment Works.
Financial services group Meta Financial Group invested an undisclosed amount in Advantage Payment Services, a US-based developer of financial data management software, yesterday. The cash was provided by Meta’s bank subsidiary, MetaBank.
Information storage network developer Arweave, social messaging app developer Mask Network and social graph protocol developer CyberConnect all contributed to a $4m funding round for Metaforo.io, the US-headquartered operator of an online Web3 community platform, yesterday. The round also featured GSR Web3 Ventures – possibly a vehicle for trading firm GSR – as well as SNZ Holdings and Hash Global.
Internet and video game group Tencent agreed yesterday to provide an undisclosed amount of funding for Spain-headquartered video game studio Novarama. The company, founded in 2003, is currently working on a massively multiplayer online game.
Digital payment technology provider Flutterwave has co-led a $3.4m funding round for UK-headquartered cashless payment software developer Dapio with accelerator operator Techstars, TechCrunch reported on Wednesday. They were joined by PactVC and angel investor Daniel Gould.
Blockchain football management startup Footium secured $3.35m in seed funding from investors including blockchain game developer Animoca Brands. It was joined by Backed VC, Stride.VC, Entrée Capital, Big Brain Holdings’ SOLBigBrain vehicle and angel investors Chris Smalling and Ahmed Al-Balaghi.
Energy infrastructure developer Lancium invested an undisclosed amount in hydrogen generation project developer Monarch Energy on Wednesday. It represents the first external funding to be disclosed by Monarch.
US-headquartered live sports platform developer Quintar received $3m in seed funding from investors including augmented reality glasses developer Nreal and sports betting technology developer SharpLink Gaming on Wednesday. SeventySix Capital led the round, having previously joined diversified media group Cowles Company, Assam Ventures and Pragya Ventures to supply an undisclosed amount of earlier seed financing in June 2021.
Splunk Ventures, the corporate VC arm of data software provider Splunk, invested an amount likely to be $2.7m in US-based cloud cybersecurity software producer Ermetic yesterday. The company said it has now raised $100m altogether, having collected a total of $97.3m from Qumra Capital, Forgepoint Capital, Accel, Glilot Capital Partners, Norwest Venture Partners and Target Global between mid-2020 and December 2021.
Chowa Giken, a Japan-based artificial intelligence technology developer spun out of Hokkaido University, raised ¥300m ($2.4m) from investors including electronic equipment manufacturer Daikoku Denki, in-vehicle system provider DTS Insight and automotive component producer Nakanishi Metal Works today. Financial services firm Daichi Mirai Shinkin Bank and regional consumers co-operative association Co-op Sapporo also took part, as did Hokkaido Venture Capital and unnamed individuals.
Health Hero, the US-based developer of a play-to-earn health game, has completed a seed round of undisclosed size featuring blockchain game developer Animoca Brands, data tracking technology producer IoTex and blockchain technology provider Polygon. The round was also backed by Blockchain Founders Fund, Wellness Ventures, Sequoia Capital Scouts and One Planet VC.
Canada-based on-demand grocery delivery service Ninja secured C$2.8m ($2.2m) from investors including freight forwarder Flexport on Wednesday. VC fund Contrary Capital and angel investor Lachy Groom also contributed to the round.
Confectionery producer Meiji Holdings provided an undisclosed amount of funding yesterday for Plimes, a Japan-based developer of treatments for dysphagia. The capital was supplied through a strategic partnership.
Effectual, the Japan-based operator of a brand management and marketing platform called Location Connect, raised ¥200m ($1.6m) in pre-series B funding from investors including regional mobile store operator Mobilecom, travel agency AirTrip and local business information distributor Future Link Network yesterday. The round was filled out by Tokyo University of Science’s Innovation Capital vehicle.
NovaXS Biotech, the US-based developer of a needle-free injection system, has completed a $1.5m seed round featuring healthcare provider Edward Elmhurst Health and medical device producer Baxter, TechCrunch reported yesterday. Angel investor Lei Ming led the round, which included Taihill Venture, NewGen VC, Courtyard Ventures and MHub Impact Fund.
VC fund Trihill Capital has added an undisclosed amount to the $1.1m in seed funding already raised by Singapore-based logistics management software developer Luwjistik, Tech in Asia reported yesterday. Arise, the fund formed by telecoms firm Telkom Indonesia’s MDI Ventures subsidiary and VC firm Finch Capital, had joined East Ventures and Global Founders Capital in the September 2021 first tranche.
Wincast, the US-headquartered creator of an interactive non-fungible token platform for live sports, completed a $675,000 pre-seed round on Wednesday featuring digital currency exchange Binance’s BNB Chain Fund Blockchain-focused investment firm CoinFund led the round, which was also backed by Dream Ventures.
M&A
Pharmaceutical and medical device producer Fresenius Kabi agreed yesterday to buy Ivenix, a US-based infusion pump developer backed by medical device maker Smiths Medical and pharmaceutical firm WuXi AppTec, for a potential $240m in upfront and milestone payments. Smiths Medical invested an undisclosed amount in the company in May 2021, four years after WuXi AppTec vehicle WuXi Healthcare Ventures and investment and financial services group Fidelity’s F-Prime Capital unit helped provide $10m to take Ivenix’s overall equity and debt financing to approximately $100m.
Diversified software producer Microsoft acquired Slovakia-based business optimisation platform developer Minit for an undisclosed sum yesterday, enabling customer management software provider Salesforce to exit. Minit had raised $11.4m as of a $7.7m round in 2019 led by Target Global and backed by corporate venturing unit Salesforce Ventures and existing investors Earlybird Digital East Fund and OTB Ventures.
Additional reporting by Liwen-Edison Fu.
