INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Singapore Golden Gate Ventures has announced the close of its newest (and third) fund for Southeast Asia at a total of $100 million.
The
fund hit a first close in the summer, as TechCrunch reported at the time, and now it has reached full capacity
Seven-year-old Golden Gate said its LPs include existing backers Singapore sovereign fundTemasek, Korea Hanwha, Naver — the owner of
messaging app Line — and EE Capital
Investors backing the firm for the first time through this fund includeMistletoe — the fund from Taizo Son, brother of SoftBank founder
Masayoshi Son —Mitsui Fudosan, IDO Investments, CTBC Group, Korea Venture Investment Corporation (KVIC), and Ion Pacific.
Golden Gate was
founded by former Silicon Valley-based trio Vinnie Lauria, Jeffrey Paine and Paul Bragiel
It has investments across five markets in Southeast Asia — with a particular focus on Indonesia and Singapore — and that portfolio
includes Singapore Carousell, automotive marketplace Carro, P2P lending startup Funding Societies, payment enabler Omise and health tech
startupAlodokter.Golden Gate previous fund was $60 millionand it closed in 2016.
Some of the firm exits so far includethe sale of Redmart to
Lazada(although not a blockbuster),Priceline acquisition of Woomoo,Line acquisition of Temanjalanandthe sale ofMapan (formerly Ruma) to
It claims that its first two funds havehad distributions of cash (DPI) of1.56x and 0.13x, and IRRs of 48 percent and 29 percent,
respectively.
When I compare the tech ecosystem of Southeast Asia (SEA) to other markets, it reallyhit an inflection point — annual
investment is now measured in the billions
That puts SEA ona global stage with the US, China, and India
Yet there is a youthfulness that reminds me ofSilicon Valley circa 2005, shortly before social media and the iPhone took off,& Lauria said
in a statement.
A report from Google and Temasek forecasts that Southeast Asia digital economy will grow from $50 billion in 2017 to over
$200 billion by 2025 as internet penetration continues to grow across the region thanks to increased ownership of smartphones
That opportunity to reach a cumulative population of over 600 million consumers — more of whom are online today than the entire United
States population — is feeding optimism around startups and tech companies.
Golden Gate isn''t alone in developing a fund to explore
those possibilities, there plenty of VC activity in the region.
Some of those includeOpenspace, which wasformerly known as NSI
Venturesandjust closed a $135 million fund,Qualgro, which is raising a $100 million vehicleand Golden Equator, which paired up with Korea
Investment Partners on a joint $88 million fund.Temasek-affiliated Vertex closed a $210 million fundlast year and that remains a record for
Southeast Asia.
Golden Gate also has a dedicated crypto fund, LuneX, which is in the process of raising $10 million.
