Uzbekistan has entered the chat

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Hello reader,

There’s a newcomer on our list of biggest deals by market this week: Uzbekistan. This is the first time I’m seeing it here, and it’s for a pretty big sum of money – a whopping US$130 million. It’s certainly nowhere near the sky-high level numbers we’ve recorded before, but it still takes some doing to raise this kind of money, especially in the current funding environment.

Seeing Uzbekistan on the list has me thinking: There are probably many other tech companies out there, doing cool stuff outside of the usual markets I’m aware of. I am really excited to see more of them step onto the global stage – I think that’d be pretty awesome.

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

Let’s dive into the biggest deals that have recently taken place.

— Stefanie

The biggest deals by market

🇨🇳 Zeron, a smart truck company from China, has secured US$174 million in a strategic investment round. Participating investors were Blue Lake Capital, ICY Capital, JOY Capital, Momenta, NIO Capital, and InnoVen Capital.

🇺🇿 Uzum is a digital ecosystem in Uzbekistan that offers services in areas such as ecommerce and payments. It has raised US$130 million in strategic investment from FinSight Ventures, Oman Sovereign Funds, Tencent, and VR Capital.

🇮🇱 Cybersecurity startup Jazz is headquartered in Israel, which is located in West Asia. It has bagged US$43 million in series A money from Glilot Capital Partners, MassMutual Ventures, Merlin Ventures, Team8, and Ten Eleven Ventures.

🇮🇳 Rozana is a rural omnichannel retail platform based in India. It has scored US$25 million in a series A round from Bertelsmann India Investments, Bikaji, Fireside Ventures, and Spark Growth Ventures.

🇰🇷 XYZ Inc is a physical AI tech company. Based in South Korea, it has raised US$9.1 million in series B funding from Crit Ventures, Kolon Investment, and Yuanta Investment.

Here’s the complete list of this week’s funding chart: 62 deals worth over US$569 million.

Startups that are raising funds

Behind the Glasswall

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