China VC Weekly: Taxes, E-bikes, Disinfection
In last week’s VC news, a diverse cohort of Chinese startups raised considerable capital across industries spanning tax automation, fintech, mobility, robotics and more.
Cross-border fintech startup Dowsure raises $20 million
Shenzhen-based Fintech startup Dowsure recently closed a $20 million Series B financing round led by an undisclosed global top-tier strategic investor, and followed by VenturesLab, Qianhaiyifang, and existing investor Plug & Play China.
Mark Mai, Founder of VenturesLab spoke about the company’s efforts, saying: “The market Dowsure is targeting has huge potential and scale. We recognize the company’s approach to solving the under-funded issues in the cross-border e-commerce industry as the best practice in this market, and this model was also approved by multiple top banks in mainland China and HK. We’re confident that Dowsure will continue to innovate and grow to become a Fintech unicorn soon.”
About Dowsure
Dowsure provides unified lending experiences for cross platform sellers, including Amazon, eBay, Shopee, Lazada and DTC sellers from Shopify and more. As Amazon’s lending service provider, Dowsure has built its proprietary assessment model for marketplace store owners while using itsdata API connectivity and account locking features to work with dozens of Chinese banks in enabling pure credit loans based on store data with no collaterals.
Tax SaaS platform Yunzhangfang bags $100m in Series E Round
Chinese software-as-a-service (SaaS) tax platform Yunzhangfang has closed a Series E financing round worth approximately $100 million. The round was led by private equity firm Apax Partners sub-fund Apax Digital and followed by GF Securities’ GF Qianhe and GF Investment.
The company plans to invest the proceeds of the funding round in the company’s IT infrastructure, brand management, product R&D, and other necessary areas.
About Yunzhangfang
Founded in 2015, Yunzhangfang uses digital approaches to help companies with their tax and financial management. The firm claims to offer its services across 36 tax regions in China.
Chinese Autonomous Driving Firm Hong Jing Drive Receives $15M in Financing
Hong Jing Drive, an autonomous driving solutions provider based in China, announced that it had completed financing of over 100 million yuan ($15.77 million), featuring exclusive investment from Prosperity7, a diversified venture capital fund under Saudi Aramco. In less than one year, Hong Jing Drive has completed three successful rounds of financing worth several hundred million yuan.
These funds are mainly to be implemented for product R&D, talent recruitment and capacity expansion. Liu Feilong, founder and CEO of Hong Jing Drive, said that automated driving technology will lead the next revolution in mankind’s travel. The technology will incorporate the commanding heights of artificial intelligence algorithms and the integration of both software and hardware. The technology is also broadly supported as it is one of China’s national policies.
SEE ALSO: Chinese Autonomous Driving Firm Hong Jing Drive Receives $15M in Financing
About Hong Jing Drive
Hong Jong Drive is a provider of computing platform solutions focused on autonomous driving. The company aims to develop comprehensive autonomous driving system solutions integrating software development and hardware design to provide a safe and efficient transportation method.
Chip Firm Tianyihexin Secures Several Hundred Million Yuan in C-Round Financing
Nanjing Tianyihexin Electronics Co., Ltd. announced that it had recently completed a C round of financing worth several hundred million yuan. This round was led by CDH Fund and followed by CITIC, SL Capital, Nanjing Gaoke and Everest Venture Capital. Its previous shareholders, Xiaomi Changjiang Industrial Investment Fund and Juntong Capital, continued to increase their investment, and Winsoul Capital acted as the exclusive financial consultant.
Since the establishment of the company, Tianyihexin has completed seven rounds of financing, among which the latest was strategic financing worth tens of millions of yuan provided by Xiaomi in January 2021.
About Tianyihexin
Founded in 2014, Tianyihexin is an integrated circuit developer specializing in analog technology. Its core team members come from ADI, National Semiconductor, Huawei HiSilicon and other top chip design companies in China and abroad. On average, its team members have more than 20 years of experience in the industry.
Disinfection Robotics Company PeroPure Raises Nearly $10M in New Funding
Chinese health technology firm PeroPure has successively completed Pre-A and Pre-A+ rounds of financing, with investment from DCM and ZhenFund. The two rounds of financing have raised a total of nearly $10 million in new funds, to be allocated for the upgrading of existing products, the research and development of disinfection robots, in addition to team expansion and market development.
Chen Zhihua, founder and CEO of PeroPure, earned a Ph.D. in Chemistry from Stanford University. Initially, the team noticed that some developing African countries count on large amounts of disinfectants for hygiene needs. Thus, the company developed equipment for disinfection using only air and water, which can be immediately applied to help eliminate the spread of influenza viruses.
About PeroPure
In 2019, Chen Zhihua founded PeroPure in the US together with several other core team members, aiming to achieve disinfection and purification abilities with just air and water. At the beginning of 2020, when the Covid-19 pandemic broke out in Wuhan, China, the PeroPure team realized the importance of public health infrastructure construction and was determined to put into practice its core technology.
E-Bike Firm URTOPIA Secures Nearly $10M in Pre-A Financing
E-Bike brand URTOPIA announced that it has completed a Pre-A round of financing with a total amount of nearly $10 million, jointly led by Lightspeed China Partners and DCM, with Obsidian Capital serving as the exclusive financial adviser. This round of funds will be used for market expansion, technological research and development and recruitment.
Zhang Bo, CEO of URTOPIA, spoke about the company: “URTOPIA is an emerging technology brand. We hope to help users return to the outdoors with innovative products in the post-pandemic era.”
About URTOPIA
The company was founded in 2021. In terms of brand building, the company advocates “Inspire Passion, Activate Life.” The company believes e-bikes are expected to become the most popular next-generation means of transportation as low-carbon lifestyles become more and more accepted by mainstream society around the world.
DataStory Secures $25M in C2-Round Financing
Big data and artificial intelligence firm DataStory announced the completion of a C2 round of financing worth 160 million yuan ($25.3 million). The leading investor was Xianghe Capital, while co-investors included existing shareholder Shunwei Capital as well asXiaomi.
At present, DataStory has provided services for more than 500 enterprises in a dozen industries. With this round of financing, DataStory will increase its investment in PaaS platforms and cognitive AI technology, and will also accelerate the update of its app store.
About DataStory
Since its establishment in 2015, DataStory has independently built a 100 billion-level data platform, providing solutions involving data collection, processing, analysis and modeling across various commercial applications.
Autonomous Driving Firm TrunkTech Completes B Round of Financing
Autonomous driving technology and services provider TrunkTech announced that it had obtained a new round of financing led by BAIC Capital and followed by Zhengzhou Holdings and Top Capital. TrunkTech has thus completed its round-B financing which will help the company continue to promote the R&D of digitalization, intelligence and unmanned trucks and provide customers with intelligent logistics solutions.
So far, the company has received investment from many top institutions in fields such as artificial intelligence, logistics and automobiles. Investors include iFLYTEK, Hidden Hill Capital, NIO Capital, Bosch Venture Capital, Eastern Bell Capital, Yuexiu Fund, ZWC Partners, BAIC Capital and Top Capital.
About TrunkTech
TrunkTech is committed to being a leading provider of L4 automated driving truck technology and capacity services for the logistics industry. The company is looking to build an entirely new generation of AI logistics networks that can cover China and is aiming to make logistics transportation more safe, efficient, and economical.
