CapitaLand launches $74m venture capital fund

Raffles City Chongqing, due to open in 2018, is CapitaLand’s biggest investment in China to date. Image credit: CapitaLand.

CapitaLand, a major real estate group in Singapore, has launched C31 Ventures, its new corporate venture arm. CapitaLand has committed US$74 million to the fund.

US$11 million has been set aside for startups in Singapore. The remaining US$63 million is earmarked for global investments. In addition to that, the Singapore government will contribute US$7.3 million to co-invest in Singapore startups, under the ESVF program.

That brings the total capital startups might get to US$81 million. What determines if all that money gets invested depends on whether CapitaLand can find enough suitable startups.

The fund targets series A to C companies in the following areas:

• design and construction
• operations and maintenance
• sales and leasing
• customer engagement
• workplace productivity
• smart living solutions

Unlike some corporate funds like Rakuten Ventures or Gree Ventures, which have an open investment mandate, C31 will back startups which can value-add to CapitaLand’s businesses.

As such, it does not have separate management. It is run directly by the parent company through an investment committee comprising of senior CapitaLand management and external advisors, which include Foo Jixun, managing partner of GGV Capital, and David Su, managing partner of Matrix Partners China. It’s unclear as of now how the committee will reach a consensus on which startup to invest in.

With US$790 million in net profit managing properties throughout Asia, CapitaLand says it can offer startups easy entry points into countries it has a presence in.

It recently met startups in New York and San Francisco, especially those in the internet of things, data analytics, VR, and AR fields.

Converted from Singapore dollars. US$1 = S$1.36.

Update on June 15, 11am SGT: CapitaLand clarified that it does not include the government’s US$7.3 million in its fund. Therefore, the fund size is US$74 million and not US$81 million as previously stated.