Sequoia Capital China, the Chinese affiliate of cryptocurrency-friendly venture capital firm Sequoia Capital, is about to raise $9 billion for its four new funds focused on Chinese startups.
In raising the capital, Sequoia China has already exceeded its initial target of roughly $8 billion, The Information news agency reported on July 4, citing two people familiar with the matter.
The report notes that the final amount of the raise is supposed to be the biggest pool of capital ever raised by a single VC firm focused on Chinese technology startups.
The funding round signals the growing investor appetite for tech investment in China coming despite a major decline in the stock market as well as China’s crackdown on tech companies, which triggered a slowdown in investments by Sequoia’s global competitors.
Sequoia China reportedly plans to close the round sometime this week, with 50% of the raise being oversubscribed.
According to some local investors, major VC firms like Sequoia China and Hillhouse were still raising money despite many American wealth and pension funds halting China investments in 2022.
“Only Sequoia and Hillhouse can raise money from international investors right now, they see it as lower risk, like making an index fund investment,” one Beijing-based investor reportedly said.
Founded in 2005, Sequoia China is one of the world’s biggest tech VC firms, known for investing in TikTok operator ByteDance.
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Sequoia China has also backed a number of crypto and blockchain-related firms, including the troubled Asian crypto lender Babel Finance, which halted withdrawals in mid-June amid the ongoing crypto lending crisis. As previously reported, Sequoia Capital China was among lead investors in a $40 million Series A funding round in Babel Finance in May 2022.
Sequoia China also previously led funding rounds for other industry platforms like the cryptocurrency wallet DeBank in 2021.
