Editor's take: The week that was — July 31

Dear Reader,

The Asia PE-VC Summit 2023 is less than a month away, and the DealStreetAsia team couldn’t be more excited to host several hundreds of the industry’s top names at our bigger-than-ever-before conference. The summit will be headlined by more than 95 speakers representing the region’s most active limited partners and private equity and venture capital firms. Check out the power-packed agenda and get your tickets now!

Onto the most significant developments of the week that went by…

California State Teachers Retirement System (CalSTRS), the second-largest pension fund in the US, has been continuously decreasing its exposure to China amid exacerbating geopolitical tensions. China fell off the pension fund’s list of top 10 countries where it has the highest market value and revenue exposure as of May 31, 2023.

French private equity major Ardian is exploring an Asia-focused fund strategy to capture rising opportunities in the region’s secondary market, according to its Singapore-based managing director Won Ha.

US private market giant Ares Management sees India as a core market as it ramps up its presence in Asia following the recent buyout of Crescent Point Capital, a Singapore-based private equity firm that manages about $3.8 billion in assets.

Private equity giant Hillhouse has agreed to acquire Harneys Fiduciary, the fiduciary business of offshore law firm Harneys, for an undisclosed amount.

Tiger Global has built a sizable stake in private equity firm Apollo Global as the hedge fund looks beyond technology investments for better returns, per a Financial Times report.

Swiss impact investor responsAbility, which manages around $4.8 billion in assets, is doubling down on technology investments in growth markets, a top executive told DealStreetAsia.

India, the largest market for private credit platform BPEA Credit, presents a “very diverse deal flow”, said the firm’s CEO Kanchan Jain in an interview.

Singapore-headquartered early-stage investor Antler is expanding to the Middle East, North Africa and Pakistan and has launched a $60 million fund dedicated to the region, with plans to hold the first close in September.

Indian early-stage venture capital fund pi Ventures has raised $85 million in the final close of its second fund, 2.5 times more than its predecessor fund, to invest in AI and deep tech startups.

In this week’s LP view, we spoke to Jim Kwok, co-founder and CEO of Hong Kong-headquartered Topaz Family Office, who noted that APAC family offices have to put more effort when it comes to ESG and impact investing.

Shanghai-based Fresh Capital, which mainly invests in early- to mid-stage venture deals, has closed a new RMB-denominated fund at 1 billion yuan ($139.5 million) to specialise in dealmaking in the carbon-neutral field.

01Fintech, a Hong Kong-based private equity fund led by a former Alibaba executive, is ramping up its bets on Southeast Asia’s financial technology sector, pushing to help promising startups become unicorns.

Elev8 Venture Partners, a venture capital firm backed by Venture Catalysts, has raised $67 million in the first close of its maiden fund to invest in startups in their Series B and C rounds of financing.

Tiger Global Management, Accel, and other investors have made a full exit from Indian e-commerce firm Flipkart, selling shares worth $3 billion to US retail giant Walmart.

Startups headquartered in Greater China raised under $11 billion in the second quarter, down 25.3% from almost $14.7 billion in Q1 2023, according to DealStreetAsia – DATA VANTAGE‘s latest report.

Naspers’s payments and fintech business PayU has agreed to sell its Global Payments Organisation (GPO) business to London-based fintech firm Rapyd for $610 million so it can focus more on the payments and fintech opportunity in India.

Indian auto major Mahindra & Mahindra has said Singaporean state investor Temasek Holdings will invest up to Rs 1,200 crore ($145.02 million) in its EV business at a valuation of Rs 80,580 crores ($9.8 billion).

Private equity giant KKR has acquired a majority stake in India’s pallet pooling platform LEAP in its latest bet in Asia’s growing infrastructure sector.

The Singapore unit of Tencent-backed fintech company Airwallex has received S$220 million ($165 million) from its parent company.

Singapore-founded e-SIM marketplace Airalo has raised $60 million in a Series B funding round backed by Peak XV Partners’ Surge to propel its growth plans as global travel activity gets back to normal.

DEG, the investment arm of German state-owned development KfW, has committed to providing $55 million in financing to Vietnam-based Orient Commercial Joint Stock Bank (OCB).

The International Finance Corporation (IFC) is weighing a $126-million loan for Cube Highways Trust (CHT), the infrastructure investment trust (InVIT) of India’s Cube Highways.

IFC is also considering extending a $95-million loan in rupee equivalent to Brookfield RJ for the development of a solar plant in India.

Indonesian agritech startup Beleaf Farms has raised $6.85 million in a Series A funding round led by Alpha JWC Ventures.

Dutch development bank FMO is considering a proposal to invest Rs 2 billion (about $24 million) in Suminter India Organics, an integrated B2B organic agri supply-chain company based in Mumbai.

Hong Kong-based Micro Connect, a microfinance platform co-founded by former Hong Kong Exchange CEO Charles Li, has secured $458 million in a Series C funding round.

Chinese ride-hailing firm T3 Chuxing has closed a 1 billion yuan ($139.9 million) extended Series A round led by local investment firm Hongtai Aplus.

Chinese robotic process automation software and solutions provider Cyclone Robotics has secured $40 million in an extended Series C financing round from undisclosed investors.

A91 Partners, a growth-stage firm led by former Sequoia Capital executives, is in advanced talks to top up its investment in healthy snacks maker Happilo.

Indian electric vehicle maker Euler Motors is exploring options to sell its mobility business, months after the GIC-backed company laid off 250 employees.

Indonesia-listed e-commerce firm Bukalapak swung to a loss in the first half of 2023. Losses attributable to shareholders for H1 stood at 389.27 billion rupiah ($25.77 million), compared with a profit of 8.6 trillion rupiah in the same period of 2022.

Traveloka Pte, the Singapore-registered entity behind Indonesian travel tech unicorn Traveloka, reported an over 74% increase in revenue for the financial year ended December 31, 2022.

Singapore-headquartered fintech unicorn Nium more than doubled its revenue in 2022, while its losses surged 28% year-on-year.

IDX-listed investment firm Saratoga Sedaya Investama plunged into the red in the first half of 2023 due to losses suffered from the declining share price of some of its listed portfolio companies.

Global Digital Niaga—the Indonesia-listed entity that owns e-commerce player Blibli, online travel agency Tiket.com, and supermarket chain Ranch Market—trimmed its losses by almost 30% in the first half of 2023 on higher revenues and an improved cost structure.

GoTo-backed lender Bank Jago announced a 40% jump in profits in the first half of 2023 as its revenue rose 30%.

Temasek-backed oat milk startup Oatside more than tripled its losses in the financial year ended December 31, 2022, as its revenue surged over 39x.

Indonesian logistics platform Waresix recorded a 12% drop in revenue for the financial year ended December 31, 2021, while tax compliance solutions provider OnlinePajak more than doubled its revenue in the twelve months ended March 31, 2022.

Indian food delivery platform Zomato has posted a quarterly consolidated profit for the first time since its inception, as more consumers ordered food and groceries on the platform.

Indonesian conglomerates Astra International and Telkom Indonesia’s investment in IDX-listed tech major GoTo has yielded different outcomes, according to their H1 2023 earnings reports.

Singapore-based wealth management platform Endowus saw its losses rise by 56% in 2022 as its revenue more than doubled in the financial year.

Indonesia’s ambitious push for electric vehicles (EV) has attracted investment commitments from local and global conglomerates. However, nascent EV startups are struggling to raise funding and face scalability challenges, finds our analysis.

The valuation correction in growth-stage deals has not peaked yet in India, multiple investors told DealStreetAsia, highlighting the recent controversies gripping the startup ecosystem.

In an interview, Monk’s Hill Ventures partner Susli Lie, who previously co-founded education financing startup ErudiFi, shared her experience navigating male-dominated fields and the reasons behind the gender gap in the top rungs of regional VCs.

Finally, we look at TikTok, which is emerging as one of Southeast Asia’s most prominent e-commerce platforms, with sales growing sevenfold in one year. The company is in early talks with regulators to obtain a payments licence in Indonesia, a move that would further its e-commerce ambitions in a major market.