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50 Best Venture Capital Firms in Singapore

Investments

Written by:

Alvin Chow

Singapore is undeniably one of the small city-states that continually impress with her thriving economic system.

This can be greatly seen in the number of startups that are growing in the country. Just in 2015, the number of start-ups reached 48,000.

One of the reasons behind the rise is the presence of venture capital firms. The role these firms have is to provide capital, technical resources and business advice to increase their likelihood of success.   

Venture capital firms, as explained in Investopedia, are a group of investors, investment banks, and any other financial institution that provides venture capital. Note that on the other hand, an individual investor who invests in startup is called angel investor

Venture capital is financing that investors provide to startup companies and small businesses that are believed to have long-term growth potential. Venture capital generally comes from well-off investors, investment banks and any other financial institutions.

Here are the 50 best venture capital firms in Singapore (in alphabetical order).
Note: Not all listed have physical office in Singapore.

1. 500 Startups

500 Startups, is a venture capital firm that believes in the capability of Internet startups to succeed through usable design, customer-focused metrics, and online distribution.

Past Investment: 500 Startups invested in TruKKe; helping it to raise $1,700,000.

2. 8capita Partners

8capita Partners invests through partnership mainly on mobile and internet companies. They live by their mission: “We Fund Executable Ideas & Exceptional Talent.”

Past Investment: It invested in Hipflat, a Thai property e-market place, this year and raised $1.3 million

3. August One

August One is a private investment firm based in Singapore.

Past Investment: It helped Shopmatic raise $5,700,000 back in 2017

4. B Capital Group

B Capital Group is a venture capital firm of Facebook’s co-founder Eduardo Saverin who is also a prominent angel investor in Singapore. It launched in 2014 with a $144 million venture fund focused on India, South-east Asia and the US.

Past Investment: It invested $10,000,000 in Mswipe Technology previously.

5. BioVeda Capital

BioVeda Capital primarily invests in healthcare companies. Furthermore, it serves as a business and scientific bridge between companies in the East and West.

Past Investment: It invested in Aslan Pharmaceuticals (ASLAN), which raised an additional $9 million to close its Series C financing round at $43 million. It also invested in Sense.ly in with $8,000,000

6. COENT Venture Partners 

COENT is a venture capital firm that provides seed and venture-stage funding to entrepreneurs and companies in Asia.

Past Investment: It invested with Gnowbe, raising $1,700,000.

7. Cento Ventures (previously DMP)

DMP now known as Cento Ventures invests in emerging digital markets, primarily in Southeast Asia, for the development of the consumer Internet and its supporting infrastructure.

Past Investment: It helped Jirnexu raised $2,000,000.

8. Crystal Horse Investments

Crystal Horse Investments is an angel investor founded in Singapore. It supports passionate, hardworking, and ethical business founders.

Past Investment: It invested in ProperHands which raised $177,000.

9. EDBI

EDBI is the Economic Development Board of the government’s corporate investment arm. It invests in sectors of biomedical sciences, information and communication technology, and select industry clusters.

Past Investment: It invested in Tessa Therapeutics, which raised $80,000,000.


10. East Ventures

East Ventures is a Singapore-based VC that provides early stage seed capital to promising startups. It has a total of 6 offices in Jakarta, Tokyo, and San Fransisco, and has invested in over 150 companies across Asia and the US.

Past Investment: East Ventures' fifth fund was worth US$27.5 million.

11. Expara

Expara has been operating since 2003 as founded by VC, Douglas Abrams who is also an entrepreneur, angel investor, and educator working in Singapore since 2000.

Past Investment: It is the lead investor of WisePass who in October 2017 raised $400,000.

12. Far East Ventures

Far East Ventures is a corporate VC and claims to be the largest property developer in Singapore. It focuses on startups in the US and Southeast Asia.

Past Investment: It helped RedMart raised $26,700,000 in 2015.

13. Fenox Venture Capital

Fenox Venture Capital’s headquarter is in Silicon Valley and has presence in Singapore, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, and the Middle East. It invests in early and growth stage companies.

Past Investment: It was the lead investor of AOS Mobile raising $2,700,000.

14. Global Brain Corporation

Global Brain Corporation is a Japanese venture capital based in Tokyo, Singapore, Seoul and San Francisco. It invests in startups in Asia, Israel, and the US. It claims to have a broad network of Japan’s major corporations.

Past Investment: It made a number of investments this year. The most notable one was with Allganize raising $10,000,000 as the lead investor.

15. Gobi Partners

Gobi Partners has offices in Singapore and is an early stage venture capital firm for IT and digital media investments in China.

Past Investment: Gobi’s investment in Eko helped raised $2,000,000.

16. Golden Gate Ventures

Golden Gate Ventures invests on companies building out consumer Internet products and services for Southeast Asia.

Past Investment: Among a number of investments, Golden Gate Ventures invested in MyMusicTaste raising $11,000,000.

17. STRIVE

Strive (Previously "Gree Ventures") is a Japanese venture capital present in Singapore. It invests in early stage Internet and mobile companies across Asia.

18. Hatcher

Hatcher is a venture capital firm that provides investments on B2B startups with features including finance and CRM support for investors, centralized knowledge banks, and access to its network of investors and mentors.

Past Investment: It had invested on Venture Round, which raised 3,500,000.

19. Hera Capital Partners

Hera Capital Partners is an “entrepreneurial investment firm” that backs companies in the consumer, media, retail, and technology space.

Past Investment: In 2016, it was the lead investor for SaladStop! which raised SGD5,000,000.

20. Incubate Fund

Incubate Fund is an early stage venture capital fund from Tokyo with a presence in Singapore. It runs a startup accelerator in Japan called Incubate Camp.

Past Investment: Incubate invested in Meleap helping it raise ¥300,000,000.

21. Intel Capital 

Intel Capital is the corporate venture arm of Intel with presence in Singapore. It invests in companies in the growth stage and above.

Past Investment: Together with other investors, Intel Capital helped GenXComm secured $7,000,000.

22. IncuVest

IncuVest is a Singapore-based group of angel investors with experience starting and building innovative companies. It consists of a group of experienced entrepreneurs.

Past Investment: IncuVest helped CLOP Technologies raise $1,000,000.

23. Innosight Ventures

Innosight Ventures is a Singapore-based early-stage venture investment firm. It invests in high-potential Southeast Asian ventures with the help of the Innosight Consulting Team.

Past Investment: It invested in Capital Match raising SGD$1,000,000.

24. JAFCO Asia

JAFCO Asia was establishment in 1990 and has since grown to become a leading brand in the venture capital industry in the Asia Pacific region.

Past Investment: It invested in AdAsia Holdings which raised $12,000,000.

25. Jungle Ventures

Jungle Ventures is a Singapore-based venture firm that funds and helps startups across Asia Pacific. It invests in global startups that are solving problems relevant to Asia Pacific markets.

Past Investment: It had invested $16,000,000 with Smartkarma.

26. Kathrein Ventures

Kathrein Ventures is a micro-venture capital fund that finances startups in Southeast Asia and Latin America.

Past Investment: In 2016, it partnered with Malaysia's early startup influencer Cradle Fund Sdn Bhd and more to put $3,600,000 together in tech startups.

27. KK Fund

KK Fund is a venture capital fund that invests in seed stage Internet and mobile startups across South East Asia, Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Past Investment: This December, it invested in Venteny Inc, which raised $2,300,000.

28. Life.Sreda

Life.Sreda is an international VC firm established in 2012 in Singapore and has already invested in more than 20 FinTech companies around the world.

Past Investment: In 2015 it invested in Ayannah raising $3,000,000.

29. Majuven

Majuven is an early and growth stage venture capital fund founded in Singapore in 2012. One of its founding partners is Lee Hsien Yang, the brother of Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong.

Past Investment: One of its two investments this year last August went to M17 Entertainment with $40,000,000 raised.

30. Monk’s Hill Ventures

Monk’s Hill Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in technology startups that will take advantage of Southeast Asian markets. It was made through a partnership of well-established entrepreneurs based both in Silicon Valley and Asia.

Past Investment: Monk's Hill Ventures made three investments this year. Its latest is with Horangi raising $3,100,000.

31. New Asia Investments

New Asia Investments is an investment firm that focuses on medtech, cleantech, and industrial innovatons. It is supported by the ESVF scheme and invests in growth stage startups.

Past Investment: In 2015, it invested in Doc Hoa Water Plant; owning 90% of it.

32. NSI Ventures

NSI Ventures invests in early-stage technology companies based in Southeast Asia. It typically invests at the series A or B stage.

Past Investment: It raised $5,000,000 with Biofourmis.

33. OPT SEA

OPT SEA is a subsidiary of Japanese e-marketing company Opt. It invests in Southeast Asian Internet business.

Past Investment: In 2016, it invested with 90 Seconds and helped raised $10,000,000.

34. Pix Vine Capital

Pix Vine Capital is a Singapore-based investment house that provides early-stage venture capital to startups in info-tech, med-tech and fintech.

Past Investment: It raised $1,000,000 with ElastiMed.

35. Quest Ventures

Quest Ventures is based in China and Singapore. It is a leading venture fund for companies that have scalability in large internet communities.

Past Investment: It invested in both Eatsy and Hapz with the latter raising SGD680,000.

36. Qualgro Venture Capital

Qualgro Venture Capital is a venture capital fund investing in Southeast Asia and Asia Pacific technology startups at Series A and Series B.

Notable Investment: It had helped Fluen Commerce raise $6,500,000.

37. Rakuten Ventures

Rakuten Ventures is an early stage corporate venture capital fund that focuses on Internet services startups.

Past Investment: It invests in a number of companies each year, one example is OneSignal which raised $7,000,000.

38. Rebright Partners

Rebright Partners is a venture capital firm based in Singapore and Tokyo. It focuses on seed to early stage Internet and mobile startups in Southeast Asia.

Past Investment: It had invested in DocsApp - Chat with Specialist Doctors 24/7, which raised $7,200,000.

39. SEGNEL Ventures

SEGNEL provides seed and venture-stage funding to brilliant entrepreneurs and companies across the South Asian and South East Asian Region

Past Investment: It had invested in Parentune in a series A Funding Round.

40. Sequoia Capital

Sequoia Capital is one of the top venture capital firms in the world. In Asia, it primarily invests in China and India startups at the growth stage and above.

Past Investment: It had invested in a lot of companies. One example is Carbo which raised $200,000,000.

41. Singtel Innov8

Singtel Innov8 is the venture capital arm of regional telco group Singtel. It invests in and partners with tech startups worldwide. It has a fund size of US$250 million.

Past Investment: Quoble raised $25,000,000 from Singtel Innov8.

42. SPH Media Fund

SPH Media Fund is the corporate venture arm of Singapore Press Holdings. It is focused on investments in the consumer tech and media sector.

Past Investment: It had investing in Snapcart which raised $10,000,000.

43. Spiral Ventures (previously IMJ Investment Partners)

Spiral Ventures is a Singapore-based VC focused on investing in startups in Southeast Asia and Japan. It is the subsidiary of Japanese web and mobile marketing firm IMJ Corporation.

Past Investment: In October 2017, it invested in CLUE, which raised $3,300,000.

44. Tembusu Partners

Tembusu Partners is a Singapore-based private equity firm focused on investments in growth stage companies.

Recent Investment: It is the lead investor of this year’s funding for Taiger and raised $5,800,000.

45. Trive

Trive (previously Tri5 Ventures) is an early stage fund investing in and accelerating growth of consumer-facing technology companies.

Past Investment: It raised $220,000 for UpCode Academy and helped Byte academy raise $2,670,000.

46. UOB Venture Management

UOB Venture Management Private Limited (UOBVM) finances privately held companies through direct equity investment, mainly in Southeast Asia and China. It is a subsidiary of United Overseas Bank (UOB) Limited.

Past Investment: It was the lead investor of Yuanyu Radio which raised $90,000,000.

47. Upstream Ventures

Upstream Ventures focuses on early-stage venture to build high-growth enterprises in Asian and global markets in sectors like Internet, interactive digital media, mobile and wireless, security and biometrics, and semiconductors.

Past Investment: Back in 2007, it invested in Delta Hydrocarbons which raised $750,000,000.

48. Vertex Ventures

Vertex Ventures is a subsidiary of Temasek Holdings, investing in emerging companies and venture capital funds throughout Greater Asia and the US.

Past Investment: It raised $210 million to invest in regional startups.

49. Walden International

Walden International is an international venture capital firm with over US$2.3 billion in committed capital. It invests in early stage technology firms in sectors such as internet and digital media, mobile, software, semiconductor, communications, and cleantech.

Notable Investment: It had invested in TechinAsia which raised $6,600,000.

50. Wavemaker Partners

Wavemaker is a crossborder early stage VC firm headquartered in LA/Singapore. It invests in a broad range of technology-driven companies in the US and Southeast Asia.

Past Investment: It had invested in Helpster which raised $2,500,000.

3 thoughts on “50 Best Venture Capital Firms in Singapore”

  1. Hi Dr Wealth, the article is great but any chance of categorizing the 50 VCs (by areas, quantum of investment) so that readers can understand the landscape better? If it has been done already, sorry for my ignorance. Thanks.

    Reply

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