Is 2021 the year for Philippine startups?

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Hello readers,

While I was writing this week’s newsletter and turning data into words, one company’s fundraising caught my attention: Philippines-based fintech startup Mynt.

I’d been speaking to a number of entrepreneurs and investors from the Philippines about the local startup landscape recently. The country is considerably behind most other markets in Southeast Asia in terms of ecosystem maturity, and you don’t often hear of major fundraising rounds beyond series A taking place.

So seeing a Philippine startup bank US$175 million in a late-stage round has me wondering whether 2021 is the year that the country will see more and bigger fundraises. After all, the Mynt investment could very well be an isolated incident that isn’t indicative of any trends to come.

You can find all other important investment deals that happened in the last few days in our weekly funding news wrap-up.

Let’s dive into the biggest deals and M&As that recently took place.

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BIGGEST DEALS BY COUNTRY

🇨🇳 Horizon Robotics: This China-based AI chip designer company bagged US$400 million from Aspex Management, Baillie Gifford, CATL, CITIC Private Equity Funds Management, China Capital Management, Hermitage Capital, Neumann Advisors, Shandong Expressway, and Yunfeng Capital in a series C funding round.

🇸🇬 Grab Financial Group: The fintech arm of the Singapore-based ride-hailing giant raised US$300 million in series A money from Arbor Ventures, Flourish Ventures, GGV Capital, Hanwha Asset Management, and K3 Ventures.

🇵🇭 Mynt: The Philippines-headquartered fintech startup raised a late-stage funding round worth US$174 million from ASP Philippines.

🇮🇳 Mfine: This Indian telehealth startup got US$33.6 million from undisclosed investors in a series C funding round.

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Lists of most active investors in the region

List of top-funded startups in Asia

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