China-based technology development firm Kuang-Chi Group disclosed $50m of venture capital investments today and pledged to provide another $250m in funding to startups.
Kuang-Chi supplied $50m to its newly formed Kuang-Chi GCI Fund & Incubator in May this year and stated at the time it would consider growing the fund size to $300m in the next three years.
The company led a $6m round for video intelligence provider Agent Video Intelligence and a $3m round for emotional analytics startup Beyond Verbal last month, and invested $20m in gesture recognition technology developer EyeSight Technologies in May.
All three are based in Israel, as is drone-focused agriculture spraying company SkyX, in which Kuang-Chi has also invested. Photon Future, a subsidiary of Kuang-Chi, had paid $5m in October 2015 for a 23% stake in Norway-based biometric authentication company Zwipe.
The remaining $250m will be invested through a second Global Community of Innovation (GCI) fund, and will be directed toward to sectors including robotics, the internet of things, telecommunications and digital health technology.
Although the first GCI fund focused on Israel, the second one’s investments will be more globally focused.
Ruopeng Liu, Kuang-Chi’s chairman, said: “The first $50m tranche of the $300m GCI fund has been invested successfully. We look to build on our momentum by expanding our investment focus and, for the first time, offering our partners the opportunity to participate in our investments.
“The GCI portfolio companies will share access to Kuang-Chi’s technology, sales and distribution capabilities, and the wide network of partners with whom we work in China and beyond. Our investments come with an opportunity to expand business in the Chinese market and to establish relationships with leaders across multiple industries.”