China’s Banyan Capital closes second RMB fund at $89m

Investors in the fund include local financial institutions and entrepreneurs, Banyan Capital said in a statement posted on its social-networking platform WeChat.

The new fund will follow a similar strategy to its predecessor - which closed at RMB320 million in July last year - and invest in angel and pre-Series A stage start-ups that plan to list domestically. Previous investments from the debut RMB fund include travel service platform Zuoche.com, micro-credit online platform Yuanbaopu.com and personal finance mobile app Jucaicat.

Unlike the RMB funds, Banyan's US dollar vehicles focus on investing in start-ups raising Series A and Series B rounds.

The VC firm also closed a co-investment fund at $100 million in May, after just one month in the market. The fund will make follow-on investments in existing portfolio companies from its debut US dollar-denominated fund, which closed at $206 million in January last year. In January, the firm reached a final close on its second US dollar fund at $362 million.
 
Banyan was founded by Zhen Zhang, Xiang Gao and Bin Yue who focused on tech, media and telecom (TMT) investments for IDG Capital Partners. Zhang and Gao, who were both partners at the firm, have been working together for about 10 years. Yue also previously worked at advisory firm China Renaissance Capital.

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• Topics
• Greater China
• Fundraising
• Renminbi fund
• Early-stage
• Venture
• China
• Fundraising
• seed
• Venture
• TMT
• Banyan Capital
• Renminbi