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Zelos, a Chinese autonomous driving technology company, has raised more than USD 300 million in a new funding round, pushing its valuation past RMB 10 billion (USD 1.4 billion). Based on publicly available information, this places it among the first autonomous logistics vehicle makers to reach that valuation threshold.
To date, Zelos has completed six financing rounds.
Founded in 2021, the company focuses on the development of Level 4 autonomous urban delivery vehicles, including robovans. Its operations center on urban trunk routes and B2B unmanned logistics.
As of the end of 2025, Zelos’ unmanned delivery vehicle business had reportedly expanded to more than 300 cities across China and entered overseas markets including Singapore, the UAE, Japan, South Korea, and Malaysia. In October 2025, it signed an order with China Post for 7,000 unmanned vehicles.
In January, Zelos completed a merger with Cainiao’s unmanned vehicle business. Following the integration, Zelos manages both brands. The combined fleet exceeds 20,000 vehicles, operating in more than 300 cities across over ten countries.
Under the merger terms, Cainiao’s brand has been licensed to Zelos and will no longer manufacture or directly sell unmanned vehicles. Instead, drawing on its logistics technology background, Cainiao will focus on specific use cases and key accounts, providing supply chain services built around robovans. Zelos will continue investing in autonomous driving R&amp;D and delivering solutions across multiple scenarios.
According to 36Kr, Zelos’ unmanned vehicles can help clients reduce last-mile delivery costs by around 50%. After adopting unmanned vehicles, courier franchisees reportedly spend roughly RMB 2,000–3,000 (USD 280–420) per month per vehicle. Including vehicle costs, depreciation, and electricity expenses, the cost per parcel has declined from RMB 0.2 (USD 0.028) to RMB 0.1 (USD 0.014), according to the report.
Zelos has expanded its deployment scale at roughly a tenfold annual rate. In 2023, it deployed 200 unmanned vehicles. That number rose to 2,000 in 2024. By early 2026, following the integration with Cainiao, the total fleet had reached 20,000 vehicles.
Zhou Qing, co-founder of Zelos, previously said that excluding R&amp;D expenses, the company has achieved breakeven. Including R&amp;D costs, it expects to break even once its fleet reaches approximately 50,000 vehicles. The timeline for reaching that scale was not disclosed.
Currently, Zelos’ bestselling product is its first mass produced Level 4 model, the Z5. The company said it is the first unmanned logistics vehicle to offer a cargo box volume exceeding five cubic meters.
Within its product portfolio, the Z series serves as the standard lineup, with cargo volumes ranging from two to ten cubic meters. The lightweight E series targets niche scenarios such as community retail and low-density goods, offering a lower-cost option for lighter-duty use cases. The L series features higher payload capacity and improved charging efficiency, designed for heavier transport demands.
In recent years, the unmanned logistics segment targeted by Zelos has entered a phase of scaled commercialization. Over the past year, companies including QCraft and Desay SV Automotive, both automotive ecosystem suppliers, have also moved into the unmanned delivery market, intensifying competition.
KrASIA features translated and adapted content that was originally published by 36Kr. This <a href="https://36kr.com/p/3697210914549632">article</a> was written by Xiao Man for 36Kr.

Zelos achieves RMB 10 billion valuation after new fundraise and Cainiao fleet merger

Venture Capital

Transportation

Autonomous Vehicles

Mobility

Investment

China

<a href="/company/huawei">Huawei</a> disclosed revenue of more than RMB 880 billion (USD 123.2 billion) for 2025 at the 2026 Guangdong High-quality Development Conference, according to <a href="https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3344428/huaweis-2025-revenues-surge-us127-billion-firm-continues-defy-us-sanctions">SCMP</a>, signaling a continued recovery despite US sanctions.
Howard Liang, the company’s chairman, revealed the figure on February 24 at the provincial government event. He said Huawei maintained steady operations and continued to provide globally competitive products and services.
The 2025 total marks Huawei’s second highest annual revenue on record, behind the RMB 891 billion (USD 124.7 billion) reported in 2020. In 2024, the company generated more than RMB 860 billion (USD 120.4 billion).
Interim results show Huawei recorded operating revenue of RMB 427 billion (USD 59.8 billion) in the first half of 2025, up about 4% year-on-year. Based on the full-year figure of more than RMB 880 billion, the second half contributed at least RMB 453 billion (USD 63.4 billion), indicating stronger weighting in the latter part of the year.
A rebound in smartphones was a key driver of the company’s latest performance.
According to <a href="https://omdia.tech.informa.com/pr/2026/jan/mainland-chinas-smartphone-market-declined-1eprcent-in-2025-as-huawei-reclaimed-the-top-spot-after-five-years">Omdia</a>, mainland China’s smartphone market declined 1% year-on-year in 2025, with shipments totaling 282.3 million units. Huawei shipped 46.8 million units, reclaiming the top position with a 17% market share. Vivo followed with 46 million units, while Apple shipped 45.9 million units.
Market leadership was less clear at a more granular level. In the fourth quarter, shipments reached 76.4 million units. Apple led with 16.5 million units shipped, while Huawei ranked fourth with 11.1 million units, closely trailing Oppo and Vivo.
<figure id="attachment_160171" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-160171" style="width: 1920px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-full wp-image-160171" src="https://console.kr-asia.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/Huawei-Pura-80-Belarus-Minsk-Dreamstime.jpg" alt="Photo shows Huawei’s Pura 80 series smartphones on display inside an electronics store." width="1920" height="1280" srcset="https://console.kr-asia.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/Huawei-Pura-80-Belarus-Minsk-Dreamstime.jpg 1920w, https://console.kr-asia.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/Huawei-Pura-80-Belarus-Minsk-Dreamstime-720x480.jpg 720w, https://console.kr-asia.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/Huawei-Pura-80-Belarus-Minsk-Dreamstime-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://console.kr-asia.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/Huawei-Pura-80-Belarus-Minsk-Dreamstime-768x512.jpg 768w, https://console.kr-asia.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/Huawei-Pura-80-Belarus-Minsk-Dreamstime-1536x1024.jpg 1536w" sizes="(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-160171" class="wp-caption-text">Huawei’s Pura 80 series smartphones on display inside an electronics store. Photo source: Dreamstime (<a style="border-bottom: 1px solid #1266f1; text-decoration: none;" href="https://www.dreamstime.com/8thcreator_info">Pavel Sytsko</a>, ID: 430278866).</figcaption></figure>
The full-year results nonetheless marked Huawei’s first annual lead in mainland China since 2020, when US sanctions restricted its access to advanced chips and the Android operating system.
Huawei’s proprietary operating system, HarmonyOS, has also gained traction. According to Liang, more than 40 million devices are now running HarmonyOS 5 and HarmonyOS 6, supported by over 75,000 applications and services. HarmonyOS has been adopted across industries including finance, power, energy, transport, and telecommunications.
Beyond consumer devices, Huawei has stepped up its push into <a href="/industry/ai">artificial intelligence</a> infrastructure. Liang said at least 43 mainstream large AI models have been pre-trained on Huawei’s Ascend chips, while more than 200 open-source models are compatible with the Ascend ecosystem. The company has positioned its in-house chip platform as a domestic alternative amid ongoing US export controls.
The latest disclosure suggests Huawei is stabilizing its core businesses while accelerating investment in operating systems and AI chips, with second-half momentum lifting full-year revenue to near-record levels.
Note: RMB figures are converted to USD at a rate of RMB 1 = USD 0.14 for reference, unless otherwise stated. Company disclosures may apply different exchange rates.

Huawei nears record revenue amid ongoing US export controls

East Asia

Smartphones

… improving our sales and after-sales service systems.
<h3>36Kr: What is Unitree’s current production capacity?</h3>
WX: At this stage, our annual production capacity for humanoid robots is at least in the tens of thousands. For quadruped models, it is also in the tens of thousands.
<h3>36Kr: Many robotics companies struggle at the delivery stage. What are the pitfalls?</h3>
WX: Delivery is critical because only when robots reach customers can a commercial loop be completed.
After-sales service is extremely important. Customers inevitably encounter issues during use. Often the problem isn’t the product itself, but that robots are still new and customers aren’t fully familiar with them.
We aim to help customers resolve usage issues and improve product usability so that robots can eventually be operated in a simple, user-friendly way.
KrASIA features translated and adapted content that was originally published by 36Kr. This <a href="https://36kr.com/p/3687105642737545">article</a> was written by Qiu Xiaofen for 36Kr.

After this year’s gala spectacle, where is Unitree Robotics headed?

Robotics

Deep Tech

Embodied Intelligence

… operator of the eponymous superapp, signed definitive agreements to acquire Stash Financial, a US-based fintech company. The deal assigns a value of USD 425 million to the initial 50.1% stake, and Grab will acquire the remaining equity over three years at fair market value. The transaction is subject to regulatory approvals and is expected to close in the third quarter of 2026.</li>
<li aria-level="1">Valiance Health, a Malaysia-based healthcare company, secured a pre-seed investment led by Gobi Partners through its SuperSeed II Fund. Jati Growth and Artem Ventures also participated. Financial terms were not disclosed.</li>
<li aria-level="1">ACE Robotics, a Chinese-founded embodied intelligence company, completed an angel round led by <a href="/company/ant-group">Ant Group</a>. Qiming Venture Partners, Golden Vision Capital, Hony Capital, Lenovo Capital, and Lotus Capital, affiliated with Shanghai Jiao Tong University, participated. Existing backer SenseCapital also joined the round.</li>
</ul>
If there are any news or updates you'd like us to feature, get in touch with us at: <a href="mailto:hello@kr-asia.com">hello@kr-asia.com</a>.

Deals in brief: Eezee and Diaflow raise funding, VentureTech backs two Malaysian firms, DBS launches AI-focused IPO fund with Granite Asia, and more

Private Equity

Merger &amp; Acquisition

Singapore

Malaysia

Australia

Southeast Asia

Oceania

Chinese electronics company Xiaomi is starting in-house production of home appliances as the company shifts to high-performance products that offer interconnectivity with smartphones and <a href="/industry/ev">electric vehicles</a>.
Xiaomi's first dedicated home appliance plant opened last October, with a total investment of RMB 2.5 billion (USD 350 million). The facility in Wuhan, Hubei, covers 500,000 square meters and has an annual production capacity of up to 7 million.
CEO Lei Jun said the plant will enable Xiaomi to produce appliances by putting customer needs first.
Xiaomi makes home appliances in over 20 categories, including televisions and robot vacuum cleaners. It develops major home appliances in-house and outsources production, while sourcing the rest from the roughly 400 manufacturers in which it has invested.
The company plans to produce 20% of its air conditioners and other products in-house moving forward.
Xiaomi's aim is to increase production and sales of value-added products. The first step is production of an air-conditioning system that consists of a single main unit and six circulator units.
It has the ability to selectively blow both hot and cold air in differing directions, and can detect and blow air toward people. Its price, about USD 7,000, was set at the same level as products from Gree Electric Appliances, a rival with a strong brand presence.
The company is also revising its sales structure. While most sales have been online, it will increase brick-and-mortar stores to make it easier to explain features to customers.
With about 18,000 stores in mainland China that mainly sell smartphones as of the end of September, the company plans to primarily increase the number of large stores that also sell home appliances. It also aims to increase stores in other countries from about 300 to 10,000 by around 2030.
While Xiaomi is known as a major smartphone maker, home appliances is also a core business. Sales and gross profits from the home appliance business account for about 30% of the company's total for each.
The business had seen continued expansion, driven by government subsidies encouraging people to replace old products, primarily in large appliances like air conditioners, refrigerators and washing machines. But sales of large appliances began to decline in the July-September period.
Xiaomi's home appliances have long been known for cost-effectiveness, with the average price of its air conditioners and refrigerators falling 14% and 34% below the market average as of 2024, according to China's Changjiang Securities.
At the same time, some customers have complained about malfunctions, and customer satisfaction has been pointed out as being low.
Changing consumer preferences in China also appear to be a headwind. Chinese consumers are increasingly polarized, with some seeking the lowest prices for practical products and others seeking products that offer high satisfaction even if they are more expensive, according to China's Soochow Securities.
This tendency is particularly pronounced among people in their 50s and Generation Z, who have the greatest influence on consumption. Focusing on cost-effectiveness alone can also lead to long-lasting price wars.
Amid that backdrop, Xiaomi is increasing the added value of its products through in-house production while also working to improve usability. The key is the company's app, which allows users to control and manage home appliances remotely, such as checking if they forgot to turn off the lights or turning on the air conditioning before returning home.
By connecting the monitor inside their EV to a camera at their front door, users can even talk to a person at their home's front door from their car.
As of the end of September, there were 21.6 million users who had connected five or more Xiaomi home appliances, excluding smartphones, to the app. From September, some products sold in China by German companies Siemens and Bosch have also become controllable through the Xiaomi app. The company hopes to expand this ecosystem and further lock in customers.
Xiaomi's earnings continue to grow, thanks in part to the success of its EVs, which it launched in 2024. But its net profit margin for the year ended December 2024 was only 6.5%, 0.8 percentage points lower than smartphone rival <a href="/company/huawei">Huawei</a>.
It hopes to increase sales of value-added products and broaden profit margins by extending the brand image it bolstered through EVs to smartphones and home appliances.
Xiaomi president Lu Weibing has said the company aims to become a leader in the domestic home appliance market by 2030. Its market share for refrigerators and air conditioners currently sits around 10%, far below major players like Midea and Haier.
This article first appeared on <a href="https://asia.nikkei.com/business/electronics/china-s-xiaomi-starts-in-house-appliance-production-in-push-for-quality">Nikkei Asia</a>. It has been republished here as part of 36Kr’s ongoing partnership with <a href="https://www.kr-asia.com/nikkei-teams-up-with-36kr-in-asia-tech-news-coverage/">Nikkei</a>.

China's Xiaomi starts in-house appliance production in push for quality

Consumer Economy

… its IP and products can resonate internationally, although no specific revenue breakdown was disclosed.
Wang often repeats a line: “We are what we are today not because of what we did, but because of what we didn’t do.” He told China Entrepreneur that Pop Mart has historically said “no” more often than “yes.” “When good news fills the sky, that’s when you should pay attention to bad news.”
He has declined opportunities to open certain stores or enter specific categories. That discipline, he said, is difficult for competitors to replicate.
Over the past year, Wang said he has focused on organizational cohesion:
<blockquote>“How do we unite everyone to accomplish bigger things? That’s the greater challenge.”</blockquote>
His ambitions have expanded, while his personal desires have simplified. On November 17, 2025, Pop Mart released a 15th-anniversary retrospective video. The final scene shows Wang nearly two decades ago, riding a tricycle to stock goods for Grid Street, where his entrepreneurial ambitions began.
He said he hopes to remain like that young man in the years ahead, grounded and composed, while guiding Pop Mart through its next phase of growth.
This <a href="https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/GJ6QTIcSBMVJ-a8KneD2zQ">article</a> was adapted based on a feature originally written by Sun Xin and published on China Entrepreneur. KrASIA is authorized to translate, adapt, and publish its contents.

Pop Mart’s Wang Ning urges restraint amid global Labubu surge

Retail

… manufacturers.
“When DJI released the first Pocket, there were many imitators. By the third generation, the barrier had risen. We barely see copycats anymore,” an industry veteran told 36Kr.
<h3>When competitors emerge</h3>
Oppo’s chairman, Chen Mingyong, is known for playing Go. Industry observers often describe Oppo as cautious in new markets, but precise in execution.
Between Vivo and Oppo, Oppo is generally viewed as more aggressive, while Vivo is seen as steadier and lower profile.
Neither company lacks resilience. Both survived China’s intense smartphone competition and expanded overseas, where distribution could involve significant logistical and financial risk.
“These companies that survived in smartphones are strong. They just look weaker when compared with even stronger rivals. In other industries, it’s almost a dimensionality reduction attack, like when <a href="/company/xiaomi">Xiaomi</a> entered the automaking business and reshaped the market within a couple of years,” said a former employee of a major smartphone maker.
For manufacturers capable of mobilizing vast resources, leadership commitment is decisive. At present, they also face margin pressure.
As Samsung and SK Hynix shift production toward high-bandwidth memory for artificial intelligence applications, supply of memory used in smartphones has tightened, pushing prices higher.
According to a February report by Counterpoint Research, memory prices rose 80–90% quarter-on-quarter in the first quarter of 2026, reaching historic highs. One industry insider described the situation to 36Kr as a “catastrophe.”
In the meantime, companies are searching for new revenue streams. Camera imaging has long been a core competency for both Oppo and Vivo. After more than a decade of investment in smartphone photography, further gains from software-based algorithm improvements are beginning to show diminishing returns.
Both companies have experimented with hardware add-ons. Vivo’s X200 Ultra, for one, introduced an attachable telephoto lens. However, compared with turning smartphones into devices with external modules, the Osmo Pocket 3 format may represent a safer and more controllable path.
whereRelatedArticle
Oppo and Vivo also benefit from brand familiarity among photography-focused users. “They are well suited for gimbal cameras. It fits their user base. Many people love the photography on the Vivo X300 Pro. The original Pocket audience overlaps,” one industry insider told 36Kr.
Some argue that hardware barriers are ultimately transitional. DJI may hold advantages in customized components and algorithm optimization, but these are engineering challenges rather than structural moats. If margins remain attractive, supplier and distributor alliances could narrow DJI’s lead.
Beyond imaging expertise, Oppo and Vivo command expansive sales networks.
According to Google Maps data, DJI operates several thousand physical stores worldwide, including authorized dealers. Vivo has more than 300,000 offline retail outlets globally.
Their channel philosophies differ. DJI emphasizes user experience, market education, and community building. Vivo relies on a sales-driven model. According to a former DJI sales executive, DJI maintains disciplined global pricing and restricts unauthorized discounts.
DJI’s distributors, however, have not endured the prolonged price wars typical of the smartphone industry. Oppo and Vivo’s agents built their networks through sustained, ground-level competition. As profit-sharing partners, they would likely welcome high-margin products such as Pocket-style cameras. If even 10% of Oppo or Vivo stores generate meaningful sell-through, the volume implications for DJI could be significant.
Even so, the Pocket 3 remains a tightly integrated product that combines micro-gimbal engineering, imaging algorithms, and software ecosystem depth.
On social media, users share detailed shooting parameters to replicate Fujifilm-style filters, seaside blue tones, vintage film aesthetics, or soft South Korean-inspired palettes. Behind those presets is DJI’s accumulated expertise in hardware and software integration.
“Hardware is one thing. The hard part is the software ecosystem and community. Be it color grading or editing know-how, DJI has applied this across its ecosystem. Starting from zero is costly,” another investor said.
KrASIA features translated and adapted content that was originally published by 36Kr. This <a href="https://36kr.com/p/3679665748225672">article</a> was written by Leslie Zhang for 36Kr.

Smartphone makers Vivo, Oppo among new contenders targeting DJI’s Pocket 3

Oppo

Video

Creative

Content

Creator Economy

… traditional film production. Director feedback fed back into the training loop.
<figure id="attachment_160079" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-160079" style="width: 422px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="wp-image-160079" src="https://console.kr-asia.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/CCTV-LNY-Gala-Seedance.webp" alt="" width="422" height="238" /><figcaption id="caption-attachment-160079" class="wp-caption-text">Graphic source: CCTV.</figcaption></figure>
The final result transformed a static painting into a minute-long sequence with dispersion, convergence, close-ups, and character interaction. Each horse retained its color and posture before reassembling into a unified tableau.
Seedance 2.0’s native output currently supports up to 720P resolution at 24 frames per second. To meet the gala’s HDR and 8K broadcast requirements, the team developed a separate enhancement pipeline to upscale the footage.
Creative control also evolved. Early in the process, engineers proposed solutions to directors still testing AI’s limits. Once the model’s usability reached what team members described as roughly 80–90%, directors resumed full creative authority, issuing detailed artistic instructions that the model could execute with greater reliability.
<h3>A “Black Myth moment” for Chinese AI?</h3>
Across both the stage performances and the Doubao app’s interactive features, one name surfaced repeatedly: Seedance 2.0.
Its release ahead of the holiday drew attention within China’s technology sector. Game Science founder Feng Ji reportedly described it as a “Black Myth moment” for Chinese AI, referencing the breakout game Black Myth: Wukong.
What changed? Earlier video-generation models often operated unpredictably. Creators built detailed storyboards, generated multiple clips, and selected the few that were usable. Maintaining character consistency typically required substantial post-production.
By contrast, ByteDance said Seedance 2.0 can generate 15–30 second sequences with camera movement, consistent characters, and synchronized audio from relatively simple prompts, with a reported usability rate above 80%. Transitions between shots are designed to follow what’s described as a director’s intent, shifting the creative workflow from trial and error toward guided generation. These performance metrics are based on company disclosures.
According to the team, the improvement did not stem from a single breakthrough. Instead, it resulted from systematically addressing weak points in training and inference. Following the industry’s broader turn toward reinforcement learning, including advances from companies such as <a href="/company/deepseek">DeepSeek</a>, ByteDance increased investment in foundational models while separating model development from product iteration.
Cost reductions have compounded the impact. If the rate of usable clips falls to roughly one in two attempts, production costs can decline to about RMB 1.4 (USD 0.2) per second, a reported 68% reduction. That shift has reportedly contributed to a rise in AI-generated short videos across platforms including <a href="/company/douyin">Douyin</a>, <a href="/company/bilibili">Bilibili</a>, and <a href="/company/xiaohongshu">Xiaohongshu</a>.
<h3>Getting a billion people to try AI</h3>
In 2015, when the gala’s hosts told viewers to “shake” their phones, the resulting WeChat "red packet" campaign accelerated mobile payments adoption across China. The infrastructure was ready. Users needed only a prompt.
AI infrastructure remains more computationally demanding. A Volcano Engine executive estimated that a red packet request consumes less than one ten-thousandth of a TOPS, or tera operations per second, in CPU power. Generating AI-powered visuals can require roughly ten TOPS per request, millions of times more computational intensity.
Why pursue mass participation now?
In a 1998 interview with BusinessWeek, Apple co-founder Steve Jobs said:
<blockquote>“A lot of times, people don’t know what they want until you show it to them.”</blockquote>
In the three years since ChatGPT gained global attention, startups have experimented with different paths to demand. In the US, Anthropic expanded in enterprise markets with its coding-focused Claude tools, while other companies continued scaling model size.
In China’s consumer-driven internet market, model capability and user acquisition tend to advance together.
As of December, Doubao’s large model reportedly surpassed 50 trillion daily tokens in usage, representing more than tenfold year-on-year growth, according to company figures. Volcano Engine’s 2025 revenue exceeded RMB 20 billion (USD 2.8 billion), also based on company disclosures.
Consumer adoption can drive enterprise procurement. A positive experience with Doubao or ByteDance’s Dreamina may influence purchasing decisions for Volcano Engine’s AI cloud services. At the same time, enterprise requirements can accelerate infrastructure upgrades.
Advanced models are a prerequisite. The more difficult task is translating technical capability into everyday utility, convincing first-time users that multimodal AI is not an abstract competition over benchmarks but a practical tool.
On this year’s gala stage, that translation may already have begun.
KrASIA features translated and adapted content that was originally published by 36Kr. This <a href="https://36kr.com/p/3687261234343559">article</a> was written by Xiao Xi for 36Kr.

ByteDance turns Lunar New Year gala into an AI bonanza

Artificial Intelligence

Entertainment

Singapore is aggressively courting private companies and financiers to boost capital-raising in the city-state, as rival financial hub Hong Kong draws in technology companies for fundraising with IPOs.
The city-state announced on February 12 and 13 that plans worth billions of dollars will be rolled out to position the Southeast Asian hub as a magnet for “growth capital,” which has been typically going into tech companies, including those specializing in emerging fields like <a href="/industry/ai">artificial intelligence</a>.
After Hong Kong recently welcomed a <a href="https://asia.nikkei.com/business/tech/semiconductors/china-ai-chip-companies-raise-billions-in-hong-kong-amid-tech-rivalry">slew of tech IPOs</a>, Chee Hong Tat, deputy chairman of the Monetary Authority of Singapore, told reporters on February 13 that the global financial industry has ample room for multiple hubs serving diverse needs.
“Different financial centers will have different strengths,” he said. “For Singapore, I think I see our strength as the connections that we have with the region, and this is not only through our venture capitalists, but also through our financial institutions—our linkages through the industry.”
Delivering the city-state’s budget for the year on February 12, Prime Minister Lawrence Wong said his government will earmark an extra SGD 1.5 billion (USD 1.2 billion) for an existing fund to draw “high-quality public listings.” The fund provides pre-IPO financing for target companies that supports them ahead of a debut on the Singapore Exchange.
Another SGD 1 billion (USD 788 million) will be set aside to cover “growth-stage companies,” with the money allocated to a scheme to amass private funding for “promising startups,” Wong said.
An additional SGD 1.5 billion will be devoted to developing <a href="https://asia.nikkei.com/business/markets/singapore-dangles-3.74bn-fund-to-jolt-stock-exchange">Singapore’s fund management industry</a> and raising investor participation in equities listed on SGX.
Last November, the MAS announced a plan for the <a href="https://asia.nikkei.com/business/markets/singapore-taps-nasdaq-for-dual-ipo-scheme-to-boost-interest">SGX and Nasdaq</a> to launch a program in which startups can be publicly listed simultaneously on both bourses.
“Many firms, especially in deep tech, find it harder to raise the larger and longer-term funding that’s needed to scale,” Wong, who is also finance minister, said on February 12. “We will therefore do more to catalyse growth capital in Singapore.”
Meanwhile, Hong Kong is building clout as a hub for tech firms to raise funds. A number of companies that have gone public in the Chinese-ruled city this year are focused on AI or semiconductor technology.
Investor enthusiasm for China's homegrown AI companies has lifted Hong Kong Kong’s Hang Seng index and the mainland's blue-chip CSI 300 to new highs.
Singapore has also benefited from investor bullishness on certain Asian equities. The benchmark Straits Times Index reached 5,000 points for the first time on February 12.
While Hong Kong’s rise can be attributed in part to AI fervor, Singapore’s rally is led by financial institutions from the more traditional banking sector.
The city-state’s authorities are hoping to complement this with an increasing clutch of tech IPOs that carry promise to deliver growth for investors.
“The STI has rallied more than 28% in the last 12 months and continues to outperform Asia peers,” JP Morgan’s Global Markets Strategy unit said in a report after Wong delivered the budget. “A strong macro backdrop, positive surprises in the fiscal buffer, and a continuing strong government commitment to reinvest and transform the economy should fuel growth in the private sector.”
This article first appeared on <a href="https://asia.nikkei.com/business/markets/singapore-chases-growth-ipos-as-hong-kong-attracts-ai-listings">Nikkei Asia</a>. It has been republished here as part of 36Kr’s ongoing partnership with <a href="https://www.kr-asia.com/nikkei-teams-up-with-36kr-in-asia-tech-news-coverage/">Nikkei</a>.

Singapore chases "growth" IPOs as Hong Kong attracts AI listings

Hong Kong