Incubate Fund Asia announces first close of Fund III, rebrands

Incubate Fund Asia, a sector-agnostic Japanese venture capital fund specialising in seed-stage investment, has announced the first close of its third fund which has a target corpus of $50 million (around Rs 416 crores). 

Incubate Fund launched its $18 million Fund II in 2019.

The Singapore-based fund also said it is rebranding itself as Incubate Fund Asia. Previously, as Incubate Fund India, it backed domestic startups such as Captain Fresh, Yulu, ShopKirana and Plum from its first two funds since 2016. 

Incubate Fund has backed 27 companies so far.

The proceeds of the fund will be used to make early-stage investments and also for follow-on investments in startups that have shown strong fundamental growth, the firm said in a release. The fund aims to build a portfolio of around 20 startups with the third fund and it will invest only 40% of its total investible corpus to create the portfolio and then use the balance to back the 'winners' in its portfolio.

Set up in 2016, Incubate Fund maintains offices in key locations, including Tokyo, Singapore, Bangalore, Mumbai, São Paulo, and Mountain View. 

The parent Incubate Fund group, headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, is structured independently of its sister funds in countries such as Brazil, the United States and India. The main Japan fund has over 200 startups in its portfolio.