Singapore’s Iterative closes second VC fund on $55m

LPs include US-based investors Cendana Capital, K5 Global, Village Global, and Goodwater Capital. Several Silicon Valley-based professionals also invested in their personal capacity, including Andrew Chen, a general partner at Andreessen Horowitz, as well as founders and executives from Dropbox, Bukalapak, Y Combinator, Foursquare, and Airbnb.

Iterative describes its model as Y Combinator-style. It invests USD 150,000 to USD 500,000 in start-ups and runs the accelerator twice a year. Investments are made upon admission to the accelerator, where Iterative works closely with founders for three months. Participating start-ups then present to a select group of investors with the goal of raising a larger round.

The firm has supported more than 65 companies across five cohorts since mid-2020 and expects to launch its sixth cohort in February next year. It claims its investees have gone on to raise USD 163m in follow-on funding from the likes of Insight Partners, Tiger Global Management, Monk’s Hill Ventures, and Wavemaker Partners. The current portfolio is said to be worth USD 1.2bn.

Standouts include financial technology provider Spenmo, which closed a USD 85m Series B round in January, Propseller, a real estate start-up that received a USD 12m Series A in August, and travel platform GoZayaan, which raised USD 8m last month. Also last month, home services player Sendhelper was acquired by real estate portal PropertyGuru.

Fund II will make larger deployments than its predecessor – USD 500,000 is the new ceiling – and take on larger cohorts. It will also support Iterative’s first follow-on investments; Fund I declined to provide follow-on rounds in order to maximise the number of start-ups that could be seeded.

“Although our mission remains the same, this fund gives Iterative more resources to provide more help to more founders,” Hsu Ken Ooi, a co-founder and general partner at Iterative, said in a statement.

• Tweet  
• Facebook  
• LinkedIn  
• Google plus  
• Save this article  
• Send to  

• Topics
• Southeast Asia
• Fundraising
• Venture
• Singapore
• Goodwater Capital
• seed
• Iterative