DragonBall Capital – venture capital fund of Chinese on-demand local services firm Meituan Dianping, announced that it has completed raising a total of RMB2 billion (US$301.66 million), exceeding the initial RMB1.5 billion target.
The capital was secured from investors including Meituan Dianping, Tencent Holdings Ltd., China Merchants Capital, New York Stock Exchange-listed asset management firm Noah Holdings, Chinese agricultural enterprise New Hope Group, Guochuang Kaiyuan Fund, and Xiangjiang Shengshi Fund.
The fund will focus on investments in catering, new retail and local services.
DragonBall Capital’s investment portfolio includes Shenzhen-based bubble tea shop chainstore HeyTea, bakery shop Bliss Cake, and B2B consumer products distributing platform Zskuaixiao.com.
In April, DragonBall Capital led a RMB400 million (US$63.3 million) series B funding round in HeyTea. In December 2017, it led a RMB96 million (US$14.5 million) series A round in Bliss Cake.
DragonBall Capital said start-ups will not only get financial support, but leverage Meituan Dianping’s resources in marketing, IT, logistics, operation and others.
