Ecosystem Roundup: Fuse bags over US$25M in Series B+; Temasek unit joins The CrownX’s US$350M round

Temasek unit joins US$350M funding of Vietnam retail platform The CrownX
The CrownX established a mini-mall concept in Vietnam that integrates online and offline commerce; It plans to develop fintech solutions, including a buy now, pay later offering; The company has raised a total of US$1.5B in investments since H1 2020.

Investible closes fund II at US$37M, bets big on SEA
Fund II had announced its first close in June at US$25M; Investible has invested in 12 companies in the region in the last four years; The sector-agnostic fund II plans to invest in 50 companies, of which 15 will likely be from SEA.

Sequoia-backed Lemonilo bags US$36M Series C
Investors include Sofina and Sequoia Capital India; Lemonilo has launched more than 40 types of products, from instant noodles and snacks to spices; They are available in the company’s online store as well as in 200,000 points of sale across Indonesia.

Fuse further extends its Series B round by raising US$25M+ for SEA expansion
Investors include East Ventures (Growth fund), GGV Capital, eWTP and Emtek; This brings the insurtech firm’s Series B to over US$50M; The company claims it has more than 60K marketers or insurance agents partners using its Fuse Pro mobile app.

Una Brands to invest over US$24M in Malaysia to acquire and grow local e-commerce brands
The firm aims to establish a regional hub in the country; To date, it has acquired over 20 brands and secured a total of US$54M in funding from prominent global investors.

UrBox scores Series A to grow its digital gifting, loyalty platform in Vietnam
Investors include Touchstone Ventures, Temasek-owned Pavilion Capital, and VinaCapital Ventures; UrBox counts 15K stores, merchant networks and over 1K top retail brands, including Starbucks, Samsung Vietnam, and Vietnam Airlines, among its clients.

AcadArena nets US$3.5M to build student gaming communities in Philippines
Investors include 1KX, Hashed, Kevin Lin of Twitch, Holly Liu of Kabam, and Kun Gao of Crunchyroll; The Filipino startup also provides financial aid and play-to-earn scholarships for exemplary student gamers to help them graduate.

Beacon VC backs Thai digital asset consulting and investment firm Cryptomind
Cryptomind is a digital asset consulting and investment firm that provides a one-stop service solution and brings innovative digital asset products to Thai investors; The funding will allow Cryptomind to scale operations in digital asset services, including its digital asset advisory services and digital asset fund management in the future.

As Southeast Asia starts to boom, an accelerator backed by Silicon Valley execs jumps in
Iterative, which describes itself as a YC-style accelerator focused exclusively on SEA, has raised US$10M from a cadre of Silicon Valley bigs, including Andrew Chen of Andreessen Horowitz, and Chi-Hua Chien of Goodwater Capital.

Circles.Life launches US$5M pre-IPO employee stock buyback
All employees with over a year’s tenure can participate in the liquidity event and some of them are set to gain “hundreds of thousands of dollars” in cash.

CreditEase, Plug and Play invest in Philippine fintech startup Smile API
Smile API for instance helps fast track the loan or financing application process by facilitating approval (or rejection) within just a few seconds; After the Philippines, the plan is to expand across Asia and the APAC region.

Play-to-earn: Understanding the popularity of Axie Infinity
Axie Infinity is the second most successful Web3 project after Ethereum (revenue-wise); Ahead of infamous projects such as OpenSea and Metamask; Axie Infinity’s revenues come predominantly from breeding fees and the rest of the proceeds come from marketplace fees.

Grab settles with ex-staffers in Vietnam as shares drop
Grab had told affected ex-employees in the country that their original shares could be “technically worthless” because they were issued by Grab Holdings and not Grab Holdings Limited, the trading entity on US-based Nasdaq.

Telio founder transfer shares to settle dispute with investors in previous venture
Founder Sy Phong Bui has transferred over 47K ordinary shares in the firm to a subsidiary of Captii Ventures; The lawsuit owes its origin to 2016 when Captii and Gobi Partners invested in OnOnPay, a now-defunct payments startup launched by Bui.

Binance withdraws Singapore crypto exchange license application
It is set to close operations thereby February 13 next year; The move comes after the Monetary Authority of Singapore issued a warning to Binance for providing payment services to Singaporeans without a necessary license.

Binance eyes crypto exchange in Indonesia
It is in talks with the Indonesian financial institution Bank Central Asia and Telkom Group to set up the exchange; Binance itself entered the Indonesian market in 2020 through its investment in local crypto exchange Tokocrypto.

Society Pass sets up regional headquarters in Singapore
The firm emphasises its acquisition ambition to build, scale and expand its service offerings to accelerate high-growth e-commerce businesses in the region; Society Pass operates numerous e-commerce and lifestyle platforms, serving both consumers and merchants in a dual-facing business model.

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