Korea

MangoPlate, a South Korean restaurant discovery service, closed an additional $6.1m funding round. Backers included Qualcomm Incorporated, through its venture investment group, Qualcomm Ventures, as well as SoftBank Ventures Korea and YJ Capital, a venture capital firm established by Yahoo! JAPAN. The company, which has raised over $7.2m, intends to use the funds to to […]

Tumblbug, a Seoul, South Korea-based crowdfunding platform for independent creators, raised 1.7bn KRW (just over US$1.5m) in Series A funding. The round was led by DCM Ventures, Naver and Strong Ventures. Founded in 2011 by Jaeseung Yum, Tumblbug is a crowdfunding platform for web cartoon, game, publishing, and music industry players with $4.4M funded since […]

Coupang, a Seoul, Korea-based e-commerce company, received $1billion in funding. SoftBank Corp. (TOKYO:9984) made the investment via a subsidiary of SoftBank. The transaction, which is expected to close at the beginning of July, 2015 will bring the total amount of funding raised by Coupang over the past year to nearly $1.5 billion. The company intends to use the […]

Noom, Inc., a New York City, Berlin, Germany- Seoul, Korea and Tokyo, Japan-based mobile health company, completed a $16.15m Series B funding. The round was led by new partner InterVest Co., with participation from LB Investment, Hanmi IT, RRE Ventures, TransLink Capital and Qualcomm Ventures. The company intends to use the funds to further develop […]

Dual Aperture International (DAI), a Seoul, Korea-based new smart camera technology startup, received a USD$1.4m investment. SK Telecom (NYSE: SKM, KSE: 017670) made the investment and closed a strategic partnership with the company in an effort to accelerate development of DAI’s smart 3D camera technology based on dual aperture 4-color (RGB-IR) sensors. It joined the […]

Memebox, a San Francisco, CA-based beauty e-commerce platform, raised $29.35m in funding. Backers included Formation 8, Goodwater Capital, AME Cloud Ventures, Pejman Mar Ventures, Y Combinator, Winklevoss Capital, FundersClub, Cowboy Ventures, and Altos Ventures, among others. The company intends to use the funds to expand its mobile and e-commerce offerings to China, the U.S., and […]

MangoPlate, a South Korean restaurant search and discovery mobile app, raised seed funding from SparkLabs Global Ventures. The amount of the deal was not disclosed. Founded by a four-member team from Samsung, KaKao, Naver, and Apple, MangoPlate provides customized recommendations based on a user’s food personality and social profile. The recommendation engine runs on a […]

Coupang, a Seoul, Korea-based online retailer, raised $300m in financing. The round was led by BlackRock Private Equity Partners, with participation from Wellington Management Company, LLP, Greenoaks Capital Management, and Rose Park Advisors. The company intends to use the funds to further grow its direct-to-consumer e-commerce offerings, to bolster its presence in its Silicon Valley, […]

Dual Aperture International (DAI), a Seoul, Korea-based new smart camera technology startup, raised $5.7m in Series A funding. The round was led by Value Invest Korea (VIK), a strategic investment firm based in Seoul, South Korea, with participation from eWBM, a licensee of DAI’s technology. Formed by combining Dual Aperture, Inc. of Silicon Valley and […]

Digital Entertainment Ventures (DEV), an early stage venture capital firm, and its Seoul-based partner, DEV Korea, have selected four companies for investment through its DEV Korea Discovery Fund and accelerator program. The companies are: moonROK, a premier source of K-pop news and entertainment. Botem, which creates human recognition sensor devices that determine people’s movement direction […]

KnowRe, a New York and Seoul, Korea-based education tech startup, raised $6.8m in funding. The round was led by SoftBank Ventures Korea with participation from KTB Network Co., SparkLabs Global Ventures. The company intends to use the funds to scale its distribution in the US and further product development and offerings for the US, Korea, […]