Early stage venture capital firm Antler has closed its second Southeast Asia fund, Antler SEA Fund II, at US$72 million ($95.31 million).
Antler says that the fund is supported by global and regional partners, with more than half of the fund composed of institutional investors, including a sovereign wealth fund, pension fund, and university endowment. The Antler SEA Fund II is more than twice the size of Antler’s first Southeast Asia fund worth US$30 million.
The Antler SEA Fund II will continue investing in early-stage tech-enabled companies in Southeast Asia with pre-launch, pre-seed, and seed capital, according to Antler’s release.
The fund targets to invest US$27 million in 45 early stage startups over the next six to nine months, and part of the funding will support startups formed during Antler’s residency programs in Singapore, Indonesia, Vietnam, and Malaysia.
Antler says that the Antler SEA Fund II has already invested in companies like food supply chain technology platform Farmio, reproductive health and family planning platform Zora Health, app development platform for GenZ creators Clout Kitchen, and more.
Founded in 2017, Antler has developed a reputation for incubating young start-ups from their “day zero”. Last year, Pitchbook ranked the VC as the most active seed-stage VC firm globally with 263 deals.
Its co-founder and CEO, Magnus Grimeland, was once part of German internet company Rocket Internet, famous for its venture building in start-ups. He co-founded Zalora before starting Antler.
In March, Antler announced that it has invested US$5.1 million in pre-seed deals with Malaysia’s sovereign wealth fund, Khazanah, across 37 verticalized AI start-ups.
Last June, the VC raised US$285 million for its “Antler Elevate fund” that aims to provide scale-up capital from Series A onwards to growth-stage start-ups globally.
Antler first Southeast Asia-focused funds — Antler SEA Fund I, worth US$30 million closed in 2019. It invested in 91 companies, including e-SIM marketplace Airalo, platform for refurbished electronic devices Reebelo, smart point-of-sale system provider Qashier, AI-driven financial data automation platform Bluesheets, and modern expense management solution Volopay.
