Japan's SmartNews secures $230m Series F
Japan-based news app SmartNews has achieved a valuation of $2 billion on closing a $230 million Series F round featuring US-based Princeville Capital and Woodline Partners as well as several local investors.
New local backers include Japan Investment Corporation-backed JIC Venture Growth Investments, Green Co-Invest Investment, and Yamauchi-No.10 Family Office, which was launched by the founding family of Nintendo. Several existing investors re-upped, including ACA Investments and SMBC Venture Capital.
It follows a $92 million Series E round in late 2019 from Japan Post Capital, Globis Capital Partners, ACA, Dentsu, and Hakuhodo DY Group. Total funding to date is more than $400 million.
SmartNews is a news aggregation service that compiles articles for users by leveraging artificial intelligence-enabled filtering. This includes a “news from all sides” function, which exposes readers to media coverage from different political perspectives. It claims partnership with more than 30 major media companies, including the BBC, Business Insiders, Bloomberg, BuzzFeed, and Reuters.
The new capital will go towards building out the company’s global presence. It plans to double headcount in the US and expand the local product offering. SmartNews claims to have gained traction with its COVID-19 vaccine dashboard and its 2020 election tracker. Monthly active users in the US doubled in 2020.
In addition to its Tokyo headquarters, SmartNews operates via offices in San Francisco, Palo Alto, New York, and Shanghai. It employs 500 people globally, twice as many as at the time of the Series E round.
“This latest round of funding further affirms the strength of our mission, and fuels our drive to expand our presence and launch features that specifically appeal to users and publishers in the United States,” Ken Suzuki, the company’s CEO and co-founder, said in a statement.
“Our investors both in the US and globally acknowledge the tremendous growth potential and value of SmartNews’ efforts to democratize access to information and create an ecosystem that benefits consumers, publishers, and advertisers.”
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