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November 22, 2007
Tokiva Seeded For Chinese Mobile Services Biz
We just confirmed with early stage investment specialist Brains-To-Ventures AG 's Jan Bomholt that it, along with business angel William Bao Bean, are backing a seed round in Tokiva, a Chinese mobile communication platform company that provides services, such as discounted mobile calls. The deal size is not disclosed.
The company is based in Beijing, with headquarters in Toronto.
As we understand it, the first service it offers - still in beta - works similar to Jajah's original concept, where users enter into a Web form the calling number and the target number. Tokiva calls back the call initiator once the call is set up. It also supports mobile email and community, according to its website.
The venture was founded by Tong Li, CEO, and Qianfei Wang, who worked together previously in a company the two founded in Toronto, Jatheon Technologies, an enterprise search and compliance management company targeting the financial services sector.
Bao Bean is on the firm's advisory board and is a partner at Softbank China & India Holdings, an early stage venture capital firm.
So how did this Swiss-based investment organization get access to a deal so far abroad? The answer is its network, which has people living in the region, and its members that are willing to travel in order to make investments.
Bomholt said that b-to-v met Tokiva's founders during privateDC 2007, a one-week trip to China in early 2007 where 25 Chinese startups presented to the“b-to-v Investorenkreis” (the name of its club of active business angels).
He added that the club is planning to invest €80M over the next three years and that it has scheduled a comparable investment trip to Russia and the Ukraine in June 2008.
View Tokiva
View b-to-v
Posted on November 22, 2007 07:59 AM | Posted to News And Updates | Permalink
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