Nokia Growth Partners (NGP), the corporate venturing arm of Finland-based smartphone maker Nokia, formed a $100m Connected Car Fund in 2014, while three of its portfolio companies were acquired for $100m+ sums.
NGP, which secured $250m from its parent company last year for its third fund, formed the Connected Car Fund in May to invest in startups developing intelligent car technology.
The fund will be run in conjunction with Nokia’s mapping technology subsidiary Here. It made its first investment in August, co-leading an $8m series B round raised by connected car service Zubie.
Perhaps the biggest news for NGP in 2014 however, involved a series of significant exits, the largest of which was achieved in June after e-commerce company Alibaba acquired the 34% of China-based mobile browser company UCWeb that it did not already own in a multi-billion dollar deal.
NGP had participated in a 2010 round raised by UCWeb, investing an undisclosed amount.
The other two substantial exits were from advertising technology provider Fyber, which was acquired for $190m by digital media company RNTS giving NGP a roughly 6x return, and India-based media company Network18, which conglomerate Reliance Industries bought for a reported $680m.
Prominent investments by NGP over the course of the year included online listings service Quikr, which raised $150m across two rounds, open source video platform Kaltura, which raised $47m in February, and semiconductor technology producer InVisage Technologies, which secured $32.5m earlier this month.