Catherine Badour
Alibaba Group’s newly formed on-demand online services unit has rocketed in value to as much as $30 billion after raising $4 billion in fresh funds, sources told Reuters.
One of Britain’s largest peer-to-peer lenders, Zopa, said on Thursday it had raised 60 million pounds ($79 million) from investors, its biggest funding round so far and the last before it becomes a fully fledged bank.
Thailand’s Kasikornbank PCL (KBANK.BK) on Thursday said it has invested $50 million in Singapore’s Grab, forming a partnership that will help launch the GrabPay electronic wallet in its sixth Southeast Asian market in 2019.
SoftBank Group Corp is looking to invest in Chinese bike-sharing start-up Hellobike, sources told Reuters, as the Japanese conglomerate bets on a market that has struggled with oversupply and tightening regulations.
Luckin Coffee, an up-and-coming coffee chain with ambitions to challenge Starbucks Corp (SBUX.O) in China, is targeting a valuation of $1.5 billion to $2 billion as it launches a new round of funding, sources told Reuters.
Deliv Inc, an Uber-like startup that uses a fleet of contract drivers to pick up online orders from stores and malls for a fee, said it has raised $40 million in a new round of funding from investors, including Alphabet Inc’s Google.
British app-only bank Monzo said on Wednesday that its backers now value the lender at 1 billion pounds ($1.3 billion), giving it unicorn status, after it raised 85 million pounds to fund the doubling of its workforce.
A group of former executives from Autodesk Inc and Flex Ltd has raised $179 million in venture capital for a manufacturing startup that aims to use a combination of robots and new software to remove much of the manual labor from manufacturing electronic devices, Reuters reported.
Israeli computer vision firm EyeSight said on Tuesday it raised $15 million in a funding round led by Hong Kong-based Jebsen Capital, Arie Capital and Mizrahi-Tefahot Bank, bringing its total raised to date to $50 million.
Team8, which creates cybersecurity firms, launched on Tuesday a second fund of $85 million to build about eight cybersecurity and data companies over the next five years, Reuters reported.