Japan's SMBC, Incubate set up USD 200m Asia VC fund
Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC) has established a USD 200m growth and late-stage pan-Asian VC fund in partnership with Japan’s Incubate Fund, which will co-manage the vehicle.
SMBC Asia Rising Fund will be headquartered in Singapore. Focus areas will be strategic to SMBC’s core banking business, including lending and payments technology, supply chain finance, digital assets, and banking-as-a-service.
SMBC noted in a statement that it expects to leverage Incubate Fund’s networks in India and Southeast Asia in particular. Incubate has invested about JPY 100bn in more than 450 start-ups since its inception in 2010, about 100 of which are outside of Japan.
Incubate is one of the more experienced Japanese VC firms in terms of exploring overseas markets with ongoing programmes targeting Southeast Asia, India, the US, and Brazil. However, it has pursued the strategy primarily as a seed specialist that works with idea-stage founders to build companies from scratch.
Incubate has experience with growth-stage investment in Japan, having closed a JPY 16bn for the strategy in 2021. The firm’s country funds are typically smaller than JPY 10bn. Its flagship Japan early-stage funds have scaled up to as large as JPY 25bn, with the latest vintage closing last March on JPY 10bn.
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