Starting the week with updates from Indian healthtech scene, a Bangladeshi fintech startup, and a Russian cybersecurity firm

SoftBank’s Masayoshi Son to raise US$21.1 billion through telco company’s IPO – Bloomberg

SoftBank Group founder Masayoshi Son is seeking to raise JPY2.4 trillion (US$21.1 billion) through an IPO of his Japanese telco operations, Bloomberg reported.

In a prospectus, the company explained that it aims to sell 1.6 billion shares at JPY1,500 apiece in a new entity called SoftBank Corp. It will start trading on December 19.

The price would surpass the offering of former national carrier Nippon Telegraph & Telephone Corp in 1987; it is predicted to be the largest IPO in the country.

Indian healthtech startups gets “all-time high” funding in 2018 – Dealstreet Asia

A Tracxn Technologies data revealed that Indian healthtech startups in 2018 has raises “all-time high” funding with continuing interests from investors, Dealstreet Asia wrote.

So far, US$510 million has been invested across 80 healthtech startups. The number was led by PharmEasy, which raised US$115 million across three funding rounds this year.

Healthtech investments have been “rising steadily” with 2016 and 2017 recording US$163 million and US$343 million respectively, but the number of rounds fell from 135 in 2016 and 130 in 2017 to 80 so far this year.

Also Read: 4 key things SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son said in India

ShopUp raises US$1.62M in seed funding round – Press Release

ShopUp, a finTech platform designed to automate online sales and credit assessment process for small-businesses in Bangladesh via social media platforms, announced it has raised US$1.62 million seed funding round led by Omidyar Network.

The funding round also included a grant from UK AID.

The company will use the funding to enhance the core technology infrastructure of its credit algorithm; accelerate acquisition to 100,000 merchants; and establish partnerships with e-commerce players, logistics companies, and offline aggregators.

ShopUp currently has 28,000 micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) on its platform, with the majority led by female entrepreneurs.

Russian cybersecurity company Group IB to open global HQ in Singapore – Reuters

Russian cybersecurity company Group IB plans to open a global headquarters in Singapore this year, or in early next year, as part of international expansion plans, Chief Executive Ilya Sachkov told Reuters.

Founded in 2003, the Moscow-based company focusses on investigating high-tech crimes and online fraud.

Its client include banks, energy companies, and telco firms in Russia, Latin America, Canada, the US and the UK. The company also has offices in London, New York and Dubai.

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Image Credit: Chris Liverani on Unsplash

The post Today’s top tech news, Nov 12: Masayoshi Son seeks to raise US$21.1B through telco company’s IPO appeared first on e27.