Kuaikan, a Tencent-backed comedian app, has simply efficiently raised $240 million in a brand new funding spherical and grow to be a billion-dollar startup.
The unicorn place helps the corporate enhance its competitiveness in China’s on-line leisure trade amid an more and more aggressive market.
In an announcement on Monday, the Beijing-based startup stated it was the most important funding deal in China’s comedian trade with the participation of CCB Worldwide, the South Korean app market One. Retailer and current buyers like Tencent and Coatue Administration. The Sequence F spherical was performed at a valuation of about $1.25 billion.
Kuaikan was based in 2014 by animator Anni Chen, which operates as a digital library of unique comics by Chinese language artists. Since then, the app has attracted big-name buyers like ByteDance and Sequoia Capital China.
Anni Chen, founding father of Kuaikan. Picture: ifeng.com
In 2019, Tencent invested $125 million on this startup. The e-comics app has elevated its month-to-month energetic customers from 40 million to almost 50 million two years in the past.
Kuaikan competes with rivals similar to Bilibili on style and value amongst younger Chinese language customers, based mostly on their preferences for cartoons, comics and video games. The app hosts works by Chen’s fellow artists throughout China and generates most of its income from subscriptions, IP licensing, and promoting.
Kuaikan’s income for fiscal 2020 elevated 27% to 437.7 million yuan ($67.four million) whereas gross revenue elevated 42% to 133.2 million yuan.
