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Funding for Southeast Asian startups hit yet another record in 2017, as late-stage companies attracted more investor backing. Activity also picked up in the series B or growth stage.
The region’s startups pulled in US$7.86 billion from investors last year, an over threefold rise from 2016’s US$2.52 billion, according to Tech in Asia’s data. That’s the highest growth since 2013 and came about despite the number of deals falling to 320 from 335.
Singapore and Indonesia continued to figure prominently on investors’ radar, while fintech (US$3.18 billion), ecommerce (US$2.87 billion), and gaming (US$553 million) attracted the most investments.
Which stages performed well?
Similar to what we’ve seen in 2016, late-stage mega funding rounds accounted for bulk of the 2017 tally. Those deals involved the likes of ride-hailing firm Grab and consumer-to-consumer marketplace Tokopedia – which both raised their series G rounds, as well as publicly listed Sea, which raised its series E prior to its initial public offering last year.
Large chunks of funding with unspecified stage were injected into the likes of Lazada, Traveloka, AirTrunk, and iflix.
Series B funding, where a supposed gap was observed in the past years, went up.
Accordingly, seed and series A rounds appear to have peaked in 2015 and slowed down since – either in terms of deal value or volume.
Addressing the ‘funding barbell’
‘All the big fish have been caught’
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