The East Ventures capital company announced on Thursday it had raised US$75 million, double the initial target of $30 million, to accelerate its investments in startups from Japan and Southeast Asia, particularly Indonesia, where most of the company’s managing partners were born.
The venture capital (VC) company’s investors include several big names from the tech world, including Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin, Meituan-Dianping CEO Wang Xing, gaming hardware Razer co-founder Kaling Lim, Singaporean investment firm Temasek and even Indonesian conglomerates Sinar Mas Group and Emtek Group.
“We could have raised more but we wanted to maintain a certain discipline in this time of euphoria. It is important to the ecosystems that the value creation velocity matches the valuation expectations,” said East Ventures managing partner Wilson Cuaca in a statement.
“What really matters to us is to be known as the best performing fund, instead of the biggest fund in Southeast Asia,” added Wilson, who is one of two Indonesian-born managing partners. The other is Batara Eto.
East Ventures first rose to international prominence when two of the startups it invested in, Tokopedia and Traveloka, announced unicorn statuses in 2017.
Going forward, the VC plans to continue investing in Seed and Series A startups regardless of sector. The company already holds shares for startups in, among other sectors, media (KataData), health (The FIT Company), education (Ruangguru), logistics (Waresix) and cafes (Fore Coffee).
The statement adds that East Ventures has invested in a total of 160 startups to date and made 30 exits, including the acquisition of startup Kudo by ride-hailing giant Grab in exchange for shares in the latter company.
Source: The Jakarta Post | 27 August 2019