Hello Betamax, I’m sure you’re familiar with Pokemon. At the very least, you’re aware of the existence of Pikachu: The yellow electric mouse is the face of the entire franchise, which includes video games, trading cards, anime, and films. In the sixth generation of the Pokemon video game, publisher Nintendo introduced the concept of Mega Evolution – “an evolution beyond evolution.” Through the use of specific items, a Pokemon would undergo a temporary transformation that does not only change its appearance and behavior but also drastically increases its strength. It made for some pretty epic Pokemon battles in the game. Where am I going with this? Well, our top-funded startup this week raised a lot of money – over 3x more than what the company that landed second on our list. It’s also making up more than 40% of the total funding raised this week. In an era when “mega rounds” – usually worth US$100 million or more – regularly make headlines, it certainly feels that some businesses are unlocking Mega Evolution with the power of a specific thing called funding. But only time will tell if the transformation is temporary or if it’s something more sustainable. You can find all other important investment deals that happened in the last few days in our weekly funding news wrap-up. 
Let’s dive into the biggest deals and M&As that recently took place. — Stefanie
THE BIGGEST DEALS BY MARKET 🇨🇳 Infinigence is an AI infrastructure software developer based in China. It raised US$343 million in series C funding from Baidu, Guokai Technology Venture Investment, Hangzhou High-tech Financial Investment, Legend Capital, Lenovo Capital, Qiming Venture Partners, Shunwei Capital, Tencent, and Xuhui Capital. 🇮🇳 Tessolve, a semiconductor solutions company from India, secured US$75 million in a late-stage round. Novo Tellus, TPG Growth, and Vector Line Capital were among the investors. 🇦🇺 Archa is an Australian corporate card and spend management platform. It banked US$35 million in a debt round from investors including Zip, The Iconic, BetaShares, Netspace, and The Fintech Fund, as well as former Macquarie executives. 🇮🇱 Israel-based Pluto Security helps businesses monitor employees’ use of AI tools and agents. The West Asian startup bagged US$32 million in series A money from Jump Capital. 🇸🇦 Autobia is a B2B automotive spare parts trading platform. Based in Saudi Arabia, it banked US$12 million in a series A round from Aljazira Capital, Artal Capital, and Waed Ventures. Here’s the complete list of this week’s funding chart: 61 deals worth over US$737 million.
M&AS 🇮🇱 Loops, an AI-powered analytics platform, has been acquired by Salesforce for US$30 million.
STARTUPS THAT ARE RAISING FUNDS Fundraising is hard. To make things slightly easier, we’ve compiled this list of fundraising startups for our subscribers. Do you run a startup that’s raising at the moment or know someone who does? Sign your company up for listing here. 🇸🇬 This startup from Singapore offers an AI learning companion for high school and college students. 🇮🇳 This Indian airline connects Tier 2 and Tier 3 Indian cities with affordable flights and a digital-first booking and travel experience. 🇯🇵 This Japan-based startup develops humanoid robots and AI for eldercare and other real-world workplaces. You can find the full list of fundraising startups in Asia over here.
BEHIND THE GLASSWALL
Image credit: Timmy Loen
Fundraising often involves reaching out to several contacts, many of whom founders might not have dealt with before. To provide some transparency to this process, we created Glasswall, a platform for founders to give feedback and recommendations on investors. Check out the full list here.
- ✅︎ “It wasn’t merely about the numbers or the metrics; it was about recognizing the potential and the passion behind our endeavor.” – Read more.
- ❌“[Runs] like a small shop, not a professional organization. All decisions made at the top. Guys at the top often make decisions for personal gain.” – Read more
- ✅︎ “Very detail-oriented and evaluates the business or future plans very fundamentally, so having proper clarity is very important for founders before they pitch.” – Read more
EXCLUSIVE LISTICLES Lists of most active investors in the region China | India | Indonesia | Japan | Singapore | Southeast Asia List of top-funded startups in Asia China | India | Indonesia | Israel | Japan | Hong Kong | Singapore | South Korea | Vietnam
THOUGHTFUL READS 1️⃣ On the SGX Koh Boon Hwee, chairman of the Singapore Exchange, shares his thoughts on the struggles that the bourse has been facing. He points out that while Singapore investors are willing to take risks on volatile growth stocks overseas, they are unlikely to make similar bets at home, where the local market still lacks flow and liquidity. Read more on The Straits Times. 2️⃣ After the exit An IPO or an M&A gives founders, investors, and even early employees access to liquidity, but this leads to a bigger question: How much of that value strengthens the next generation of startups? Check out Korea Tech Desk to dive deeper. 3️⃣ In the spotlight Startups based in Singapore snapped up 91% of Southeast Asia’s US$10.7 billion venture capital funding in the first nine months of 2026. That’s up from 62% in 2019, and participation from US investors has remained relatively steady since 2020. Read more on the Singapore Business Review. 4️⃣ Eyes on the youth Young Ventures is a student-led VC firm launching across a broad network of universities including Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, and Stanford. The platform, which focuses on deeptech, operates on the premise that students in these institutions can find founders and university-originated technologies earlier than conventional investors.. Learn more about the fund here. 5️⃣ Anatomy of a successful VC A recent research paper analyzed the largest dataset of individual venture capitalists to date, painting a detailed portrait of these investors. They found that success is highly concentrated among a small number of VCs and that there are some correlations. Find out what these factors arehere about what these factors seem to be. Today’s edition was written by Stefanie Yeo. It’s edited by Eileen C. Ang. |
