SINGAPORE -- SoftBank Ventures Asia is understood to have reached the second close for its latest early-stage fund at 341 billion won, or $341 million, this month.
The Seoul-based venture capital unit of SoftBank Group had made an initial close for the fund at $270 million in July after roping in Korea's National Pension Service as one of its limited partners. The fund's other limited partners include parent SoftBank, Korea Venture Investment Corp. and other regional investors.
According to sources close to the deal, SoftBank Ventures Asia's latest fund, the Growth Acceleration Fund, will primarily target investments in early-stage artificial intelligence developers in the Asia-Pacific region, excluding China, for which it has a separate $300-million vehicle it jointly operates with U.S. private equity firm TPG Growth.
SoftBank Ventures Asia's early-stage fund will target startups across the Series A to C stages to invest amounts between $2 million and $15 million each.
In an earlier interview with The Korea Herald, CEO JP Lee said the firm wanted to back startups that use AI to build highly disruptive products and services. These could be in sectors such as health care, quantum production, sports, manufacturing or medical diagnostics.
He said the investment fund is less focused on the sophistication of AI technology as it is on the ability to build AI-based services which create "tangible value, whether in cost reduction or time savings."
SoftBank Ventures Asia has significantly enlarged its focus in recent years. The SoftBank Group subsidiary first established itself as SoftBank Ventures Korea in 2000 and has increasingly deployed capital in global markets since 2011. In January this year, it re-branded itself as SoftBank Ventures Asia to reflect its expanded focus.
The VC firm has made several notable investments in Southeast Asia such as in Indonesian e-commerce unicorn Tokopedia, Vietnamese online marketplace Sendo and Singapore's used-car platform Carro.
According to its website, it has over $1.1 billion of funds under management and has invested in over 250 companies across 15 funds.
SoftBank Ventures Asia recently beat 135 candidates to win the best venture capital firm of the year at Korea VC Awards 2019, which was hosted by Korea Venture Investment Corp.
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