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Venture Capital - Tuesday, November 7, 2006

Monday Chinese Madness: 3 New Start-up Fundings

Chinese media company Han Rong Media Group's classified ad website Sosoko.com received 120M Yuan from D&H Capital and Asian Groove HK's subsidiary Powerway. Sosoko can best be described as a commercial Craig's List, alhough today it only covers Shainghai at this point.


Reports indicate that Han Rong Media Group accounts for 70% of the classified ad market in Shanghai and looking at this traffic it is not surprising.

Wupima has raised $3M in Series A led by IDG-Accel China Growth Fund, according to PE Wire. Details are thin, and we are not 100% sure they are accurate. But this site can best be described as a Chinese Friendster. You can create an account, upload your picture and reveal to China who you are: blood-type, car, other lovers, salery, etc. There is not much traffic here yet to speak of.

PayEase raised $14.5M in its latest round of financing, according to VentureWire. Based in Santa Clara, but serving the Chinese market, PayEase delivers mobile payments via SMS. They could probably offer it in the US, but because credit card use is particularly low in China they expect to find a unique market on the mainland.

The company has merged with Beijing CapInfo's PayLink division. Investors include the WI Harper Group; Max Fang, CEO of venture firm Maxima Capital Management; Charles Skibo, chairman and CEO of HouseRaising and a former CEO of U.S. Sprint, Springboard-Harper Technology Fund, and Tech Alliance.

PayEase is run by a big hitter in China - Fred Sum. He was the founding Director of Hutchison Telecom, COO of Star Telecom Group and Co-Chairman of Tricom which was acquired by Mr. Richard Li, rename Pacific Century Cyber Works (PCCW), and later used to acquire Hong Kong Telecom.

View - Payease site
Read- - Classifieds Site Receives 120M Yuan Investment (Pacific Epoch)