Japan's Angel Bridge closes third fund on $72m
Japanese early-stage investor Angel Bridge has closed its third fund with JPY 10bn (USD 72m) in commitments from local investors.
LPs include the Organization for Small & Medium Enterprises and Regional Innovation, Fuso Holdings, Ark Totan Alternative, Okachi Securities, Shoko Chukin Bank, Matsui Securities, Monex, SMBC Nikko Securities, SMBC Venture Capital, and PF Capital, a unit of Pharma Foods.
Angel Bridge was founded in 2015 by four angel investors aiming to build out the local start-up ecosystem. They are Yutaro Kasai (previously of Unison Capital, Bain Capital, and Goldman Sachs), Masaei Hayashi (previously of Itochu Corporation), and Hokuto Inoue and Naoki Kiritani (both previously of Goldman Sachs).
The idea is to identify companies with potential to be global operators in disruptive technologies, invest early, and provide significant networking and mentoring support. Speed is a priority; the firm claims to make investment decisions in one to two months.
The new vehicle, styled as Angel Bridge Unicorn Fund 2, targets university-launched start-ups, deep tech, and IT-related opportunities. It will make initial deployments of up to JPY 500m, mostly leading rounds, with follow-on investments accumulating to up to JPY 2bn per start-up.
Its predecessor vehicles are the Angel Bridge Deal-by-deal Fund and the Angel Bridge Small-cap Fund, launched in 2015 and 2019, respectively. They have deployed a combined JPY 5.2bn in 22 companies to date.
The new fund has invested JPY 2.7bn across 11 start-ups to date. They include genome-rewriting platform Logomix, personal savings app Fivot, and Goals, an accounting tool for restaurants. The latter raised a JPY 1.5bn round last year featuring Angel Bridge and Shoko Chukin Bank. SMBC Venture Capital and Monex are also investors in Fivot.
More on North Asia
Latest News
Asian GPs slow implementation of ESG policies - survey
Asia-based private equity firms are assigning more dedicated resources to environment, social, and governance (ESG) programmes, but policy changes have slowed in the past 12 months, in part due to concerns raised internally and by LPs, according to a...
Singapore fintech start-up LXA gets $10m seed round
New Enterprise Associates (NEA) has led a USD 10m seed round for Singapore’s LXA, a financial technology start-up launched by a former Asia senior executive at The Blackstone Group.
India's InCred announces $60m round, claims unicorn status
Indian non-bank lender InCred Financial Services said it has received INR 5bn (USD 60m) at a valuation of at least USD 1bn from unnamed investors including “a global private equity fund.”
Insight leads $50m round for Australia's Roller
Insight Partners has led a USD 50m round for Australia’s Roller, a venue management software provider specializing in family fun parks.