Chinese investor Shunwei Capital raises $1.21B as a part of global fund

Chinese early- and growth-stage investor Shunwei Capital has raised close to $1.21 billion in new funds. The venture fund, which was started by Xiaomi founder Lei Jun and Tuck Lye Koh in 2011, took to LinkedIn to share this news.

In the post, the company said,

“Including this round of fund raising, Shunwei Capital manages around U$3 billion in dollar funds and RMB (Chinese Yuan) 2 billion in RMB funds.”

Over the past year, Shunwei has been aggressively looking at opportunities in India, and investing in categories like social networks as well as fintech. Within fintech, it is making investments in lending and consumer finance startups which seem to be having a larger impact.

Following are some of the top, recent investments:

• September 2018: Social platform ShareChat raises $100 million from Shunwei Capital and others
• September 2018: Consumer loan platform Upwards Fintech raises Series A from Shunwei Capital and others
• July 2018: Consumer credit platform LoanTap raises its third equity funding from Chinese investor Shunwei Capital and others
• July 2018: Language knowledge sharing platform Vokal gets $5 million in Series A led by Shunwei Capital
• February 2018: Self-publishing platform for professional and amateur writers Pratilipi raises $4.3 million in Series A funding

As a part of the announcement, the venture fund also said,

“Shunwei Capital will continue to focus on early and growth stage investments, working with entrepreneurs to fulfil their dreams and build great companies.”

Last year, Shunwei Capital also invested in micro-lending startup KrazyBee and led the Series A round along with Xiaomi.

While focussing on small cheque sizes, Shunwei took a leap into growth stage funding while leading the round in regional language social platform ShareChat.

Over the course of last year, Chinese investors have been looking actively towards India. Apart from Shunwei Capital. Tencent, Fenqile and Plum Ventures and even smartphone maker Xiaomi tested the waters.

Market data estimates that in 2017 about $2 billion has been invested in Indian startups alone, up 3x from 2016.