SoftBank Ventures Asia leads $5m round of IP protection platform

MarqVision, an AI-powered intellectual property (IP) protection platform based in the US, has received US$5 million in seed funding led by SoftBank Ventures Asia, the early-stage venture capital arm of SoftBank. Y Combinator and Bass Investment also joined in the round.

MarqVision co-founders Mark Lee (left) and DK Lee / Photo credit: MarqVision

MarqVision, which was part of the Y Combinator Summer 2021 cohort, offers automated counterfeit detection and reporting services on its platform. It covers 100 markets in 24 countries, with the firm recently opening an office in South Korea.

The fresh funds will go toward expanding the company’s infrastructure and enhancing its capabilities in Asia.

“With the rapid growth of the counterfeiting industry, there is more awareness around counterfeiting and demand for more sophisticated IP protection than ever before,” said Mark Lee, CEO and co-founder of MarqVision. The firm also recently launched an anti-piracy software that caters to the gaming, entertainment, and animation industries.

Counterfeiting has been rampant online, with some big ecommerce platforms being hit with copyright infringement accusations. The authentication and brand protection market is expected to hit US$3.7 billion by 2026.

“The ramifications of counterfeiting for economic progress and innovation cannot be understated,” said JP Lee, CEO of SoftBank Ventures Asia. The VC recently invested in South Korean AI startups VoyagerX and Upstage, and it also led a US$30 million round for Indonesian fintech firm Oy.