In May, we noted 28 early stage funding announcements made by startups in the Southeast Asia startup ecosystem.
One of the notable trends during the month is investments into big data, which was prevalent in markets such as Indonesia. Throughout the years, the market is known to attract more investments in the fintech and e-commerce sectors, but investments into Delman and Bonza indicate the wide variety of verticals operating in the market.
These funding rounds also saw the participation of fellow startups such as Qlue, in addition to angel investors and VC firms.
Vietnam also continued to attract investors’ attention with at least six early stage investments announced in May.
But perhaps the most interesting one is the investment into Bobobox, which happened at the peak of a pandemic that has threatened the travel and tourism industries.
GudangAda
Funding: US$25.4M in Series A
Investor(s): Sequoia India, Alpha JWC, Wavemaker Partners
This round brings the company’s total fundraising to date to US$36 million.
Also Read: Morning News Roundup: Tigerhall, Growthwell Group raise funding rounds
FoodHub
Funding: “Hundreds of thousands in US Dollar” Seed
Investor(s): MP Solution
The funds will be used to scale FoodHub’s business with a focus on Vietnam’s Northern market and to further promote its supply chain growth.
JobHopin
Funding: US$2.45M in Series A
Investor(s): SEMA Translink, KK Fund, Mynavi Corporation, NKC Asia, Canaan Capital, angel investors
JobHopin has previously raised US$710,000, which brings its total fundraise to over US$3 million since inception.
Klikdaily
Funding: Undisclosed Series A
Investor(s): Global Founders Capital
The fresh funds will be used by Klikdaily to focus on developing technology and infrastructure “to expedite its mission to empower the development of mom n pop stores across the country”.
Entropica Labs
Funding: US$1.8M in Seed
Investor(s): SGInnovate, Wavemaker Partners, TIS Inc, Entrepreneur First, Lim Teck Lee Group, V1 Capital, Rigetti Computing
Entropica plans to use the funding to expand its technical team and continue the development of its proprietary software architectures as well as gaining greater access to a growing number of quantum computing systems.
Flow (AsiaCollect)
Funding: US$6M in Series A
Investor(s): DEG, Dymon Asia Ventures, SIG Asia, SCB10X
The company said that it will use the capital for expansion as well as acquire loan portfolios.
IUIGA
Funding: US$10M in Series A
Investor(s): Konimex Technologies
The fresh money will be invested across IUIGA’s Singaporean and Indonesian operations, with Indonesia being the key focus for 2020.
Also Read: Roundup: ShuttleOne raises US$500K seed funding round led by Sirius Venture
Dathena
Funding: US$12M in Series A
Investor(s): Jungle Ventures, Caphorn, SEEDS Capital
Dathena will use the capital for R&D and hire staff across sales, marketing, and customer success functions in New York City.
FoodRazor
Funding: US$900K in Seed
Investor(s): Cocoon Capital, Found.Ventures, angel investors
Niles Toh, CEO, and Founder of FoodRazor, said that the company will use the fund to support FoodRazor’s expansion into new markets and to support other invoice-heavy industries such as accounting, manufacturing, and logistics.
BravoHR
Funding: Undisclosed in Seed
Investor(s): Zone Startups Vietnam, 1005 Ventures
Involved in the round is 1005 Ventures, the investment fund founded by former executives of Google, Alibaba, and BCG to support startups, especially in the fields of transportation, medical, and human resource management.
JobsGo, WindSoft, EcomEasy
Funding: US$200,000-500,000 in Seed
Investor(s): Viet Valley Ventures
Viet Valley Ventures is a newly-established homegrown venture capital firm that was founded in 2019 by senior tech executives working in Silicon Valley. The three investments were announced on the same occasion.
Pintek
Funding: Undisclosed Seed
Investor(s): Accion Venture Lab
The new capital will be utilised to enhance Pintek’s platform to meet the needs of underserved students and schools during COVID-19.
LeadIQ
Funding: US$10M in Series A
Investor(s): Eight Roads Ventures, Tim Draper, LAUNCH Fund
The fresh capital will be used by the company to invest in R&D, and for market expansion and hiring talent.
Also Read: Property tech startup Hoozing raises pre-Series A funding round from SmileGate Investment
GoodWork
Funding: US$1.6M in Seed
Investor(s): Chaac Ventures, Elysium Ventures, Kairos K50, angel investors
Andrew Koger, co-founder and CEO of GoodWork, said that GoodWork plans to expand into Vietnam and Thailand by the end of this year or early 2021.
Holmusk
Funding: US$21.5M in Series A
Investor(s): Optum Ventures, Health Catalyst Capital, Heritas Capital, angel investors
The new funding round allows Holmusk to expand its US operations in New York City.
Bizzi
Funding: Undisclosed Seed
Investor(s): 500 Startups, angel investors
The company is focused on helping accountants automate financial processes like pay bill, approvals, receipt scanning, compliance, and book-keeping using its RPA (robotic process automation) technology.
Shipper
Funding: US$20M in Series A
Investor(s): Naspers, AC Ventures, Insignia Ventures Partners, Lightspeed Venture Partners
Shipper was part of Y Combinator’s Winter 2019 batch.
TADA
Funding: Undisclosed Series A
Investor(s): Shinhan Bank, Samkee Automotive, iloom
The funding round followed a US$5 million Series A investment announced in December 2019.
Hoozing
Funding: Undisclosed Pre-Series A
Investor(s): SmileGate Investment
The investment, according to Hoozing CEO and co-founder Hai Le, will be used to make sure the business is ready to assist the needs of landlords and customers in the middle of COVID-19 pandemic.
Also Read: Roundup: Filipino startup Advance raises seed funding; SoftBank Vision Fund to cut staff
ShuttleOne
Funding: US$500,000 in Seed
Investor(s): Sirius Venture Capital, Andromeda GmbH, private investors
ShuttleOne CEO Lim Hong Zhuang stated that the company will use the fresh funding to expand the company’s operations in Malaysia and Indonesia and to launch its services in Thailand and the Philippines.
Bobobox
Funding: US$11.5M in Series A
Investor(s): Horizons Ventures, Alpha JWC Ventures, Kakao Investments, Sequoia Surge, Mallorca Investments
The Bandung-headquartered startup will use the money to accelerate its product improvement and location expansion. It wants to enhance ‘Pods’ features and overall experience by growing its tech team and strengthening its manufacturing and operating models.
Delman
Funding: US$1.6M in Seed
Investor(s): Intudo Ventures, Prasetia Dwidharma Ventures, Qlue
The company said that will use the newly raised capital to establish an R&D centre in Surabaya and make fresh hires, specifically earmarking Indonesians who are currently working as data scientists in Silicon Valley.
Bonza
Funding: Undisclosed Seed
Investor(s): East Ventures
The company’s new funding will be used to scale up its new operations and focus on product development.
GoBear
Funding: US$17M
Investor(s): Walvis Participaties, Aegon N.V.
The company said that the latest round of capital will be utilised for continued expansion across three growth pillars: An online financial supermarket, digital insurance brokerage, and digital lending, “all built on a strong foundation of alternative data”.
Sentient.io
Funding: Undisclosed Series A
Investor(s): Digital Garage Group, ABC Dream Ventures, Leave a Nest Group
The company said it intends to use the new fund to scale the platform to the global market, especially to fulfil the surging demand for the Digital Transformation from Japanese corporations.
Also Read: AI-empowered data platform Sentient.io secures Series A funding led by Digital Garage Group
Advance
Funding: Undisclosed Seed
Investor(s): Next Billion Ventures, Dymon Asia Ventures, Accion Venture Lab
The latest round of capital will be used to improve Advance’s current technology and operations, as well as to explore different products and new markets.
Wiz.ai
Funding: US$6M in Pre-Series A
Investor(s): GGV Capital, Wavemaker Partners, ZWC partner, Insignia Ventures, and Orion Fund
The money will be used to expand Wiz.ai’s product offerings and grow its team in Southeast Asia. It also plans to expand its geographical coverage globally.
Voiz FM
Funding: Undisclosed Seed Funding
Investor(s): 500 Startups Vietnam
The Vietnamese startup will spend the money on product development and market expansion.
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