Startup fundraising in Southeast Asia and India presented a picture of contrast in the month of October. While funding cooled in Southeast Asia in the absence of any $100-million+ deal, Indian startup funding bounced back riding on four megadeals, according to proprietary data compiled by DealStreetAsia.
Startups in Southeast Asia raised about $320 million from 36 equity deals in October, down 41.5% month-on-month from $547 million across the same number of transactions in September. October’s biggest deal was valued at only $70 million, bagged by Singapore-based wealth management platform Endowus in a round anchored by Illuminate Financial.
In India, private equity and venture capital investments surged 60.5% to $1.83 billion in October, from $1.14 billion in September. However, deal activity eased slightly to 100 transactions from 108. The largest deal in the month was struck by Zepto, which raised $450 million led by the California Public Employees’ Retirement System along with existing investor General Catalyst.
This week, Google, Temasek, and Bain & Co released their 10th annual e-Conomy SEA report, which showed that Southeast Asia’s digital economy is on track to surpass $300 billion in gross merchandise value (GMV) this year, with revenue forecast at $135 billion. The region’s private funding rose about 15% year-on-year to roughly $8 billion, led by late-stage rounds and deals in digital financial services that account for about half of value.
The week also saw some significant developments surrounding the Grab–GoTo merger that is said to be back on track. GoTo released a statement saying it has consistently backed government policies that will benefit driver-partners and merchants, including those involving mergers or acquisitions. This came days after a spokesperson for the Indonesian president said the government was discussing a possible merger or acquisition involving the two Southeast Asian tech giants.
Grab President and COO Alex Hungate, however, downplayed the merger reports. “That story has come and it’s gone away, maybe three or four times in the last six years,” he said.
Meanwhile, Bloomberg reported that SoftBank Group, along with other shareholders including Provident Capital Partners and Peak XV, are reportedly calling for the ouster of GoTo Group CEO Patrick Walujo, who is perceived as opposed to a takeover by Grab.
Financial Times further reported that the merger talks include a proposal to give Danantara a minority stake in the combined group, with special rights over the Indonesian operations. Analysts, however, say the sovereign wealth fund’s involvement raises questions over the boundaries between regulation, investment, and industrial policy.
Keep following DealStreetAsia as we track every twist and turn of this mega-merger thriller.
Moving onto the other headlines of the week:
LP-GP updates
Japan’s secondaries market is picking up amid a boom in private equity deals, as investors seek liquidity and capital recycling strategies to take advantage of new opportunities. Secondaries-focused Bee Alternatives’s founding partner, Chen Yuliang, told DealStreetAsia that the firm is seeing more limited partners seek exits—partial or otherwise—from fund stakes.
Global private markets investor Pantheon has built a team of three in Singapore to deepen its private wealth coverage in Southeast Asia, as part of the firm’s broader Asia-Pacific expansion plans. Pantheon managing director and head of International Private Wealth Victor Mayer, who has relocated to the city-state from London to oversee the business’ growth strategy for the Asia-Pacific region, is leading the team.
International Finance Corporation (IFC) is considering a $15-million equity commitment in Catalyst MENA Climate Fund II, the latest regional infrastructure vehicle of Catalyst Investment Management.
Three Southeast Asian GPs—Emerging Markets Entrepreneurs, Emerging Markets Investment Advisers), and Asia Business Builders—have joined forces to launch the Mandala Entrepreneurship Fund, an early-stage vehicle aimed at closing the region’s “missing-middle” financing gap.
Fundraising
US- and Singapore-based venture capital firm B Capital has raised at least $307.3 million for its latest early-stage vehicle, Ascent Fund III, according to a disclosure with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.
Rasmal Ventures, backed by Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund, is seeking to invest further in Hong Kong to bring the city’s supply-chain, fintech, and healthtech innovations to Gulf countries, as the firm eyes a final close of its inaugural fund at $100 million by year end.
AI-focused investment firm Monolith Management has reached the final closes of its second US dollar fund and maiden Chinese yuan fund, with total commitments to the two new vehicles reaching $488 million.
Source Code Capital, the Beijing-based venture capital firm behind ByteDance and Meituan, has raised $600 million for its dual-currency growth funds to focus on thematic opportunities around China’s artificial intelligence and going-global mega trends.
Kaya Founders, a Philippine-based early-stage venture capital investor, has secured a $25-million final close of its latest fund that seeks to back more Filipino founders.
GFTN Capital, the venture arm of the Global Finance & Technology Network (GFTN), has partnered with Japan’s SBI Holdings and its Singapore-based subsidiary SBI Ven Capital to launch a $200-million fund to invest in growth-stage fintech ventures.
Startup news
KKR has agreed to sell Singapore’s Goodpack back to the founding Lam family for about $1.4-1.5 billion. The divestment comes more than a decade after KKR took Goodpack private from the Singapore Exchange in 2014 through a buyout deal valued at about S$1.4 billion ($1 billion) via its second Asia private equity fund.
Shareholders of The Farrer Park Company, which operates one of the largest private tertiary hospitals in Singapore, are said to be considering selling their stakes in the company. Low Tuck Kwong, Indonesia’s third-richest man who controls Bayan Resources, one of the top five coal producers in the country, is among the shareholders looking to sell.
Grab-backed Indonesian digital banking player Superbank is said to be preparing for a public listing towards the end of this year. At the upper end of the price range, the company could raise up to 5.36 trillion rupiah (around $321.6 million) in the IPO.
Singapore-based used-car marketplace Carro’s losses for the year ended March 2025 narrowed 21.7% year-on-year to S$22.9 million, reflecting improved operational efficiency despite higher employee and operating expenses. Carro’s revenue in the year rose 14.9% to S$1.2 billion ($920 million), driven by continued strength in vehicle sales and financial services across operations.
Singapore sovereign wealth fund GIC has led a $91-million Series B round in Infravision, a US-based developer of aerial robotics systems for powerline construction and maintenance.
International Finance Corporation is looking to become an anchor investor in the initial public offering (IPO) of MR. DIY Group‘s Thai arm with a proposed 810 million baht ($25 million) equity investment.
Chinese surgical robotics developer Cornerstone Robotics has completed a new funding round at about $200 million from investors, including the government-owned Hong Kong Investment Corporation Limited (HKIC).
d-Matrix, a specialist in generative AI inference for data centres, has raised $275 million in a Series C round, lifting its valuation to $2 billion and total funding to $450 million. The oversubscribed round was co-led by BullhoundCapital, Triatomic Capital, and Temasek, with new investors including Qatar Investment Authority and EDBI.
The International Finance Corporation has proposed an investment of up to $40 million in CBL Investments Limited, the holding company of the Sri Lanka-headquartered food manufacturing conglomerate The CBL Group, according to a disclosure.
The Indonesia Financial Services Authority (OJK) has revoked the licence of fintech peer-to-peer firm PT Crowde Membangun Bangsa’s (Crowde). This follows a series of supervisory actions taken earlier this year, including the suspension of CROWDE’s lending operations and its placement under special monitoring.
Grab Holdings will invest $60 million in remote driving firm Vay Technology, as the Singaporean firm tries to leverage its ride-hailing platform to tap into autonomous vehicles.
Acclime, a Hong Kong-based advisory and corporate services firm, has selected a handful of bidders to submit binding offers for the company, in a deal that could value the firm at more than $900 million.
Dutch development bank FMO has proposed an investment of $22 million in Sunsure Energy Private Limited to partially finance the company’s solar photovoltaic project in Tamil Nadu.
Aether Fuels, a startup focused on sustainable fuel production technologies, will build a facility off the coast of Singapore to produce sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) for commercial use, in partnership with Aster—the joint venture between Indonesia’s PT Chandra Asri and global commodities trader Glencore.
Singapore-based startup Transcelestial has raised $9.7 million in funding from investors, including MPower Partners, a venture capital fund founded by former Goldman Sachs Japan Vice Chair Kathy Matsui; and NTT Finance.
VPBank Securities, a brokerage owned by Vietnam Prosperity Bank, has raised approximately 12.7 trillion dong ($482 million) in its initial public offering.
Dutch development bank FMO has proposed a $50-million investment in Indian independent power producer AMPIN Energy Transition to support the company’s expansion of its renewable energy portfolio.
Varaha, an India-based climate-tech company that generates carbon credits through nature-based solutions, has raised $30 million in funding from Mirova, an affiliate of Natixis Investment Managers focused on sustainable investing.
AI startup Parallel Web Systems, founded by former Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, has raised $100 million to build web search infrastructure for artificial intelligence agents and fund deals with online content owners.
Deep dives
Southeast Asian tech giant Sea Ltd more than doubled its quarterly profit from a year earlier, supported by higher revenue across its e-commerce, digital finance, and gaming units. The company also raised its full-year GMV growth guidance for Shopee to 25%, from 20% earlier, after reporting what it called a record quarter for order volumes. In the earnings call following the results, chairman and CEO Forrest Li mentioned the word “growth” 25 times. And for a good reason. In Q3 2025, Sea Ltd posted growth across all its three main verticals.
Talks of a potential merger between GoTo Group and Grab have resurfaced, with government-backed investment entity Danantara emerging as a participant in preliminary discussion channels. While officially pitched as a facilitator protecting national interest, its involvement has raised questions over the boundaries between regulation, investment, and industrial policy.
Years after China’s Internet giants Alibaba, ByteDance, and others disrupted Indonesia’s tech startup landscape, scrappy Chinese entrepreneurs are seeking to build high-growth businesses in the archipelago, bringing e-commerce, supply-chain, and livestream commerce expertise—honed in Shenzhen, Guangzhou, and Hangzhou—to the world’s fourth most populous nation.
When Maynilad finally pushed through with its long-delayed listing this week, it did more than add a new name to the exchange. It showed where the market currently sits: quiet and risk-averse, but not entirely shut, with room for large issuers to tap capital when conditions align.
Asia’s LP-led secondary market is entering a more sophisticated phase this year. Although pricing still depends on each portfolio, bid-ask spreads for strong Indian and select Asian assets are narrowing, showing a clear shift towards quality, said experts tracking the sector.
Founded in 2019 by Michael Gryseels, a former McKinsey senior partner with over 15 years of experience in Asia, Singapore-based Antares Ventures is building what it calls “a new class of regional problem-solvers”—startups addressing systemic challenges in energy, urbanisation, food, and healthcare.
In an exclusive interview with DealStreetAsia, Gaurav Ahuja, partner at ChrysCapital, reflected on the homegrown private equity giant’s journey since its inception in 1999. “Our initial focus was on early-stage venture investments, bringing proven US business models to India… however, we quickly realised the market wasn’t ready,” he said. “We pivoted to sectors like IT and financial services, which became the backbone of our early success.”
After a string of governance scandals shook Southeast Asia’s startup ecosystem—triggered by the collapse of Temasek-backed Indonesia’s eFishery—the state investor said tightening oversight and delivering exits are crucial to reviving confidence among global backers.
Should this year’s public market outperformance in Hong Kong and mainland China sustain, it is expected to boost investor confidence in the private markets over the next few quarters and contribute to a better fundraising environment, according to investors at Hamilton Lane.
Vietnam’s digital healthcare sector, once a bright spot for venture capital investments during the pandemic years of 2020-23, is now suffering a sharp downturn as investors pull back and startups struggle to sustain user engagement post the COVID boom. The funding contraction reflects a broader recalibration among investors, who are now prioritising financial sustainability and proven business models over growth-driven bets.
