U.S.-based VC Firm Launches $100 Million Fund Focused to Invest in Southeast Asia The fund is looking to invest in 15 to 20 companies based in Southeast Asia, Hong Kong, India, Australia and New Zealand

By Aparajita Saxena Jan 21, 2020

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MassMutual Ventures, a global investment company, on Tuesday launched its second Southeast Asia-focused fund of $100 million to invest in early and growth stage companies in the digital health, fintech, and enterprise software sectors.

In addition to Southeast Asia, the company will also target start-ups in Hong Kong, India, Australia, and New Zealand.

MassMutual Ventures, a unit of Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company, currently has $350 million in capital under management, spread across four funds - two $100 million funds in the U.S., and two in Southeast Asia - $100 million and $50 million deployed earlier.

"This additional capital will allow us to invest in more start-ups in the region that have the ability to generate positive returns for MassMutual," said Doug Russell, managing director and head of MassMutual Ventures in a press statement.

Started in 2014, the investment firm has invested in nearly 40 companies across the globe, including Europe, Israel and Southeast Asia.

In Singapore, it has invested in Milieu, a market research and data platform, Biofourmis, an AI-based platform for therapeutic decision support, and insurtech company Qoala, among others.

The company aims to invest in an additional 15 to 20 start-ups in the region using capital from the new fund, its investment officers said.

Aparajita Saxena

Former Deputy Associate Editor, Asia Pacific

Aparajita is Former Deputy Associate Editor for Entrepreneur Asia Pacific. She joined Entrepreneur after nearly five years with Reuters, where she chased the Asian and U.S. finance markets.

At Entrepreneur Asia Pacific, she wrote about trends in the Asia Pacific startup ecosystem. She also loves to look for problems startups face in their day-to-day and tries to present ways to deal with those issues via her stories, with inputs from other startups that may have once been in that boat.

Outside of work, she likes spending her time reading books (fiction/non-fiction/back of a shampoo bottle), chasing her two dogs around the house, exploring new wines, solo-travelling, laughing at memes, and losing online multiplayer battle royale games.

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