Indonesia-based internet company Garena rebranded to Sea Ltd yesterday, disclosing $550m in new funding from investors including diversified conglomerate JG Summit Holdings and food supplier Uni-President Enterprises.
The round also featured financial services group Cathay Financial, venture builder GDP Venture, asset manager Farallon Capital Management and hedge fund Hillhouse Capital. Uni-President participated through its President International Development Corporation subsidiary.
Founded in 2009, Sea operates a diversified internet business that includes an e-commerce platform called Shopee, online video streaming, chat, mobile gaming and a financial services platform known as AirPay.
The round increased the company’s overall funding to $1.05bn. Although Sea did not disclose the valuation at which it closed the round, it was valued at $3.75bn as of a $170m series D round in March 2016 led by Malaysian government-owned fund Khazanah Nasional.
Sea has not revealed details about its previous funding, but its other investors include China-based internet group Tencent, Singaporean state-owned firm Temasek, Global Digital Prima Venture, Mistletoe, Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, General Atlantic and Keytone Ventures.
Much of the funding will be invested in Shopee, which Sea said has more than doubled in size since August 2016, and which has an annualised gross merchandise value of more than $3bn.
Lance Gokongwei, president and chief operating officer of JG Summit Holdings, said: “We look forward to working closely with Sea to deepen its presence in the Philippines and to nurture the growth of our country’s eSports and e-commerce ecosystems.”