Sovereign wealth funds — government owned investment vehicles — have become increasingly active tech investors over the last few years. Last year, in particular, saw a big jump in deals and dollars invested by sovereign wealth funds.
Using the CB Insights database we created a business social graph of the ten most active sovereign wealth funds investing in private tech companies, based on the number of deals the funds participated in since 2010. These ten sovereign wealth funds have made at least 2 investments in a private tech company over the time period.
Over the last seven years, France’s Banque publique d’investissement, or Bpifrance, has been the world’s most active sovereign wealth fund investing in private tech companies. Bpifrance was originally set up as a sovereign investment fund in 2009.
The government of Singapore owns the world’s second and third most active funds. These two funds are Temasek Holdings, which distributes dividends solely to Singapore’s Ministry of Finance, and GIC, the private equity investment arm of the government of Singapore Investment Corporation.
Rounding out the top five sovereign wealth funds are Malaysia’s Khazanah Nasional Berhad (KNB) in fourth and France’s Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations (CDC) at fifth. Bpifrance is actually a 50% owned subsidiary of CDC, however the two funds have no co-investments in private tech companies and we separate them in our analysis since they operate independently. The other half of Bpifrance is owned by the French State.
The Middle East is home to 3 of the 10 most active sovereign wealth funds in tech. These three funds are: Kuwait Investment Authority (KIA), The Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), and the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia (PIF), which invested $3.5B in Uber in June 2016. The PIF also participated in a $1B funding round in November 2016 to the up-and-coming e-commerce company Noon, located in the United Arab Emirates.
The largest equity deal to a tech company with participation from a sovereign wealth fund was a $4.5B Series B obtained by the Alibaba Group affiliate company Ant Financial Services Group, in April 2016; China Investment Corporation participated in that round.
Visualizing sovereign wealth funds in tech
We used our Business Social Graph tool to visualize how the ten most active sovereign wealth funds in tech and their portfolio companies are interrelated.
These funds do not often back the same companies. However, exceptions include a number of co-investments between Temasek Holdings and GIC. The two funds have each backed the companies iTutorGroup, Xiaomi, and Alibaba’s Cainiao, among others. Also, QIA is a co-backer of Uber alongside the PIF, and QIA backed Flipkart along with GIC. KIA and Bpifrance each invested in the company BedyCasa, while Temasek and China Investment Corporation have each participated in funding to Didi Chuxing.
Check out the full list of sovereign wealth funds featured in this brief under the Business Social Graph below.
Click on the image to enlarge.
The ten most active sovereign wealth funds investing in tech:
Funds are listed in order by number of equity investments in private tech companies since 2010.
BPI France: Located in France, with $27B under management.
Temasek Holdings: Located in Singapore, with $194B under management.
GIC: Singapore, $350B under management.
Khazanah Nasional Berhad: Malaysia, $35B under management.
Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations: France, $165B under management.
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Sovereign wealth funds were active tech investors in 2016. Sign up for a free trial and look for Sovereign Wealth Funds in the Collections tab.
Track sovereign wealth fundsChina Investment Corporation: China, $885B under management.
Kuwait Investment Authority: Kuwait, $592B under management.
Qatar Investment Authority: Qatar, $335B under management.
Australian Future Fund: Australia, $91B under management. 2017 investments by the fund were included in our ranking but are not shown in the BSG above. They are: cloud-infrastructure company Fugue ($41M Series D) and cybersecurity company Bitglass ($45M Series C).
Public Investment Fund Of Saudi Arabia: Saudi Arabia, $160B under management.
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