Over 100 startup deals and $1.24b raised this week

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Hello readers,

Is it me or the investors have no chill this week? Because funding was on 🔥!

Just take a look at these fundraises that have gotten some attention:

• A China-based novel (yes, as in fictional prose) 📚 app closed nearly $100 million
• An Indonesia-based payment firm bagged US$53 million
• A beauty startup in Indonesia secured US$58 million.

That’s not all. We compiled all the investment deals this week into a chart below so that you can see how eye-popping the movement of funding is in Asia. The full chart is available in our weekly funding news wrap-up article (🔒).

Apart from funding activities, here’s another exciting movement in the venture capital front: Sequoia Capital India has secured US$1.35 billion for two new funds that target opportunities across India and Southeast Asia.

Let’s dive into this week’s biggest deals plus mergers and acquisitions (M&A).

The biggest deals by country

🇮🇳 Reliance Jio: An Indian conglomerate that owns telecommunications and digital services. Raised US$253 million from Intel Corporation.

🇨🇳 Kuaidian: A Chinese content platform for novels and drama videos. Raised US$100 million from GGV Capital, MorningSide Ventures Capital (晨兴资本), and Sequoia Capital.

🇮🇩 Social Bella: An Indonesian beauty ecommerce platform. Raised US$53 million from ACE & Company, B Capital Group, BRI Ventures, Insignia Ventures Partners, Quiet Capital, Tiger Global Management, and Y Combinator.

🇸🇬 Transcelestial Technologies: A Singaporean internet infrastructure startup. Raised US$9.6 million from Airbus Ventures, Cap Vista, EDBI, Entrepreneur First, Partech, Seeds Capital, Tekton Ventures, and Wavemaker Partners.

🇯🇵 Sharedine: A Japanese platform that helps users on business trips find chefs. Raised US$2 million from Coral Capital, Future Venture Capital, Monex Ventures, Nissay Nippon Life Insurance Company, Sumitomo Mitsui Venture Capital, and ISGS Investment Works.

Full list of this week’s funding chart: 106 deals recorded in Asia and $1.24b raised (🔒)

Other interesting funding news

M&A

Deep-thinking reads

Pitch decks for your reference

Lists of most active investors in the region

List of top-funded startups in Asia