Rust Belt
Increasing investment in Ohio and Illinois.
Untapped Markets
Companies headquartered in the high-value real estate markets of Hawaii, Alaska, Vermont, and Rhode Island remain underrepresented in PropTech.
Figures 20a and 20b give the comparison between the raw count of deals and investors distributed by state, across the United States for the 2023-2024 fiscal year. As we can see, while investors remain heavily concentrated in California (319) and New York (161), a second tier of investors emerging Texas (51), Massachusetts (42), Florida (34), and Illinois (30), before a third tier emerges in Pennsylvania (21), Washington (20), Colorado (14), DC (14), Georgia (14), and Virginia (14). Yet, the raw count of deals shows more stratification.
Deals are still concentrated, perhaps in a more balanced fashion, between California (161) and New York (124), with a second tear being Texas (59), Florida (42), and Massachusetts (42), while the third tier still includes Colorado (21), Washington (20), Illinois (17), and Georgia (14). Yet, this tier also includes Ohio (18), Delaware (17), and North Carolina (14), as well as Arizona (14). Clearly, Florida, Texas, Colorado, and Massachusetts were all active locations for PropTech deals in the past year.
At the same time, just because the largest number of investors and deals remain concentrated in the states of California and New York, it is not necessarily the case that the largest amount of capital is engaged in those deals. Last year, we saw a surprising amount of capital invested in the Healthcare Trust of America deal in Arizona. This year, North Carolina and Texas emerge as significant, yet surprising, locations for top PropTech fundraising.
Figure 21 shows the distribution of PropTech deals by state for the 2023-2024 Fiscal Year. PropTech companies in New York raised the most by far, collecting some $8.6 billion USD, followed by a surging North Carolina (with $2.88 billion USD) and a lagging California ($2.08 billion USD). DC ($1.25 billion), Texas ($1.13 billion) and Delaware ($1.03 billion USD) rounded out the top five.
As noted above, as Texas is a relatively surprising location for fundraising it is also worth highlighting that some of these impressive numbers result from the long-term processes of transforming the state’s economy. Traditionally an oil state, there are at least some PropTech companies in Texas looking toward a greener future. For instance, Bedrock Energy is a provider of construction services that are fundamentally transforming the heating and cooling of real estate, having raised $8.5 million for autonomous geothermal HVAC technology. Situated with a company headquarters deep in oil-country, in Austin, Texas, Bedrock energy is looking toward the future of buildings, and catalyzing the green transition of the real estate industry. While many new construction buildings are fitted with standard delivery for natural gas, Bedrock Energy has been developing autonomous drilling technology and subsurface simulation software to provide for widespread, affordable, and accessible geothermal heating and cooling solutions.
Founded in 2022, Bedrock energy raised $8.5 million in seed funding from Wireframe Ventures in October of 2023. The funds will be used to accelerate the manufacturing and deployment of core geothermal technologies, to aid the introduction of all-electric geothermal HVAC systems and help real estate properties achieve Net Zero standards during construction and maintenance. Further, the company has one active patent for geothermal well construction technology, and a pending patent for drilling technology, making it a ripe offer for an M&A deal soon.
If we set aside New York and California, where the big PropTech companies and most well-known disruptors got their start, major deals in Delaware, Texas, and North Carolina included the likes of AmWins (Charlotte, North Carolina, completing three deals: $1 billion, $839 million, and $763 million), Corporation Services Company (Delaware, $983 million), Optimal Blue (Plano, Texas, $705 million), and Meriton (Irving, Texas, $250 million). Among these AmWins is notable as it provides a network of insurance brokers the ability for global coverage across a vast array of real estate asset classes, ranging from residential to commercial, while Meriton focuses on HVAC technology. Meanwhile, Corporation Services Company is a provider of a variety of corporate and business services and Optimal Blue is an online mortgage provider. Another significant player is also Fundrise, an investment platform, which uses technology to reduce friction in the investment process and secured $125 million USD in debt refinancing this past year. This is to say that the top of the field is quite diverse in this case, although it is notable that both Optimal Blue and Meriton are based in Texas.
Optimal Blue is the operator of an online mortgage platform – based in Plano, Texas – that caters to industry professionals, especially originators, lenders, and investors, further underscoring the promise of the PropTech industry in Texas. The aim of the platform is to connect originators with secondary investors, while providing them with loan-level price data, and enabling them to enhance their workflow efficiencies, stay competitive, and confidently execute lending strategies. Their pricing and eligibility engine – the Optimal Blue PPE – is utilized by 64% of the Top 500 mortgage lending companies in the United States. On September 14, 2023, Constellation Software, a leading provider of software services headquartered in Toronto, Canada, acquired Optimal Blue for $705 million USD. Optimal Blue will continue as an operating subsidiary under the merger agreement. Previously, Optimal Blue was operating under an agreement between Capital Analytics and Black Knight. While Compass Analytics acquired a stake in the company in 2020, Black Knight acquired a stake in 2022. Then, when Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) Mortgage Technology – as a leading provider of data, technology, and market infrastructure – acquired Black Knight, ICE Mortgage Technology negotiated the sale of Optimal Blue as part of the deal.
Notably, there was virtually no PropTech investment in companies headquartered in several states with hot real estate markets, including Hawaii, Alaska, Vermont, and Rhode Island, suggesting that these markets could be good locations for breakout players soon. Additionally, states in the rustbelt, including Ohio ($761.33 million USD), Michigan ($40 million USD), Indiana ($113.21 million USD), and Illinois ($591.79 million USD) range indicate these states are beginning to show their potential as well. With relatively affordable real estate and solid access to capital, we should not be surprised to see more companies headquartered in the states of the rustbelt in the near future, where PropTech companies are already becoming part and parcel of the process of urban renewal. Further, if we look at the most active investors in American markets, the start-up and accelerator scene is quite alive and well.
Figure 22 illustrates the top ten American investors active in the PropTech ecosystem, as measured by the total number of investments they have made and controlled by color for their primary type of investments. As we can see, the Accelerator/Incubator firms remain the most active investors in the field, although the government supported investments made by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and US Department of Defense (USDOD) remain enormous. Next, we have the venture firms, 500 Global, New Enterprise Associates, Sequoia Capital and Accel. In the midst of the pack, finally, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts (KKR) is a leading global investment firm that specializes in private equity and buyout deals. Importantly, KKR has recently acquired a $1.64 billion Student Housing portfolio from Blackstone’s REIT, meaning they have become deeply invested in the student housing industry and are likely to be keen to similarly invest or partner with PropTech companies operating in that space. Still, for disruptors hoping to make a splash, while it would certainly behoove them to submit proposals to Techstars, Y Combinator, and Plug & Play Technologies, they might also want to consider the lay of the land in terms of which investors have the most access to dry powder.
Figure 23 is an illustration of the top ten American investors as measured by their dry powder, or the amount of capital that they have on-hand that is not committed to a specific deal and is therefore available to potential founders of PropTech companies. The largest of these firms, Ares Management, appointed a new co-head of Real Estate (Julie Solomon) during the 2023-2024 FY. Additionally, the firm is expanding abroad, and has appointed Bryan Southergill (a former KKR executive) to head the firm’s real estate team in the region. After Ares Management, however, most leading investors with large amounts of dry powder, per data pulled on June 1, 2023, were private equity and buyout firms. Partnered corporations (BDT & MSD Partners and Sixth Street Partners) also have significant access to dry powder, as does Andressen Horowitz (AH), the Venture Capital firm with the greatest access to dry powder in the PropTech ecosystem. After all, AH recently reported that they have raised $7.2 billion across five funds to fuel future investments, including $1.25 billion dedicated to improving the use of AI in building and construction trades, $1 billion towards applications, and $600 million towards founders and companies supporting American interests. These signals indicate that AH may be looking to build off their $350 million USD 2022 investment in Adam Neumann’s new company, Flow.
Figure 24 shows the top American PropTech deals of the 2023 – 2024 fiscal year. In addition to the enormous Black Knight and Better deals, AmWins and Corporation Services Company (CSC) had huge deals as well. Better Home & Finance Holding Company is a renowned top-industry player, as the – if not, one of the – world’s most prominent digital-first homeownership company focusing on elements of the mortgage process, although they also now assist with the process of titling property and homeowners’ insurance as well. The company has combined numerous forms of technological innovation, from big data analytics to machine learning, to provide fresh thinking with a deep customer focus while revolutionizing the process of obtaining a mortgage.
In August of 2023, Better acquired Aurora Acquisition – a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) – through a reverse-merger for $5 billion USD. The result of this enormous deal was to move Better to the public trading market, as the company began to be traded on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange with the ticker BETR in March of 2023. Although the deal was announced in March, it was only completed in April. While the $5 billion USD moved for the reverse merger represents the total invested equity of the deal, the deal also increased the valuation of the company, from $2.7 billion beforehand, to $7.7 billion USD afterward. Given that Aurora Acquisition was formed as a SPAC in 2020, it seems that this deal was in fact years in the making. Ultimately, Better’s SPAC deal unlocked $565 million USD of fresh capital, which included a $528 million convertible note from SoftBank and additional equity from NaMa Capital. Ultimately, the long-haul series of deals delivered $1.3 billion USD to Better’s balance sheets, funneled through Aurora Acquisition, which is significant considering Better itself is an industry giant and claims to have funded more than $100 billion USD in mortgage volume across six years. Finally, both investors and industry watchers should be on the lookout for reviews on the performance of a new product: the one-day mortgage. The one-day mortgage allows customers to go online, get pre-approved, get their rates locked, and get a commitment letter in just 24 hrs. As this product was only released in January 2023, it will likely continue to disrupt the market for years to come.
After Better, Metropolis’ $1.7 Billion dollar deal to acquire SP Plus’ parking facility management services is a striking example of an AI-enabled platform seeking to expand its coverage. After all, Metropolis is a developer of a computer vision operating model that is revolutionizing the efficiency of parking spaces in urban areas. Computer vision models focus on enabling computers to identify and understand moving objects and people in images and videos. Through utilizing this path breaking field of computing, Metropolis can improve revenue generation and reduce operating expenses, enabling real estate partners to optimize net operating income. For asset owners, Metropolis is improving access to contemporary parking amenities, as well as multi modal mobility options. Through a combination of debt and equity as established by a Series C venture round that included, among others, the participation of BDT & MSD Partners, Vista Equity, Assembly Ventures, and Temasek Holdings. While the $1.7 billion USD transaction was supported by $650 million of debt financing, the funds were leveraged to make a critical acquisition: SP Plus, a parking management and ground transportation company. SP Plus primarily provides a range of ancillary services, including valets, shuttles, taxis, municipal meter collection, and enforcement. Thus, these services will be incorporated into Metropolis’ North America-based platform operations, in over 360 cities, serving millions of consumers and processing over $4 billion in payments annually.
While we have examined the details of AmWins, SoFi, CSC, and CoStar elsewhere, very little attention has been paid to the socio-political import of the Cadre deal. Cadre is an online real estate focused investment platform aimed at institutional and high net-worth investors, founded by Ryan Williams, Joshua Kushner, and Jared Kushner in 2014, two years before the Kushner family saw its rise to fame through their affiliation with the Trump Administration in the United States. Cadre is the developer of a data-centric investing platform designed to compel real estate investment opportunities, using data science to reduce the time it takes to analyze assets, identify market trends, and pursue opportunities. The company’s technology enables investors to diversify their portfolios, mitigate risk, and tap into compelling long-term returns. Founded in 2014 by Ryan Williams, Joshua Kushner, and Jared Kushner, the company was first backed by two early-stage VC rounds, totaling $64.40 million USD, with later stage VC rounds, including some undisclosed financing, bringing their fundraising totals to at least $133.40 million USD. Key investors included Peter Thiel JD, Mark Cuban, and Jeffrey Jordan (with the latter representing Andreessen Horowitz).
With the acquisition of CADRE by Yieldstreet in November 2023, Yieldstreet expanded their portfolio of products that focus on opening private market investment to new investors. Previously, Yieldstreet provided investors with a platform for acquiring investments in art, real estate, legal and other industries. Thus, CADRE’s acquisition represents a contribution to their real estate portfolio, as the CADRE platform will allow users to unlock the potential of investing in high end real estate. Since Yieldstreet’s investment minimums start at a mere $5,000, it is safe to say that they had previously emphasized the democratization of investment, successfully broadening their user-base, but at the same time leaving the high-end real estate market relatively untouched.
In January 2024, Yieldstreet announced they had completed the acquisition of CADRE, solidifying Yieldstreet’s leadership in the private market investing platform ecosystem, as they now cater to low end, mid-range, institutional and high net worth investors alike, with more than $9.7 billion in value held in investments across the two platforms. Now investors will have access to an unparalleled range of private market asset classes presented through a bespoke investor experience – including the managing of tax advantaged accounts and portfolios, to proprietary secondary market capabilities – and much much more, all on one, seamless, unified platform.
Major UK-based firms lead by assets, with French and Swedish firms also showing significant influence.
It will not surprise our readership that the greatest number of investors in PropTech in Europe are located in the United Kingdom. However, it is a slight surprise that France beats out Germany when it comes to the raw number of investors in the PropTech Industry. Nonetheless, since the French economy is part of the “old guard” of continental Europe, it is also not a terrible surprise to see France leading the pack by our measure of raw numbers of investors this year as well.
Figure 25 shows the raw count of European investors active in the 2023 – 2024 fiscal year by country in Europe. The United Kingdom had more than twice the investors of France (148 compared to 72), while Germany was not terribly far behind France, with 62 total investors. Spain (32) and Switzerland (34) were virtually tied in the fifth and fourth spots respectively. Next, the Netherlands and Sweden (27 and 26 respectively) came in sixth and seventh. Austria (22) came in eighth with Italy (20) not far behind, while Denmark (15) and Norway (15) were tied for the number ten spot. Given the above balance of top players, it also follows that the top investors in Europe, as measured by assets under management (AUM), have their headquarters located in the United Kingdom.
Figure 26 shows the top 20 European investors by their Primary Investment Type and HQ location by country, as indicated by their national flag. Of course, nearly half of the list are firms in the United Kingdom, with the large investment banks (NatWest Group & Lloyds Banking Group) leading the pack. Institutional investors, like BpiFrance’s sovereign wealth fund still hold prominent positions, of course. Then, in the middle of the pack, there are a host of PE/Buyout firms, much like the United States, including the French firms Ardian and Eurazeo, along with the British firms, Apax Partners and TowerBrook Capital Partners. Surprisingly, the only significant Venture Capital firm on this list is located in Sweden. Even with their impressive $7.398 billion USD of AUM, they barely squeak into the top 20 investors in Europe as measured by assets, just barely ahead of the French PE/Buyout firm Naxicap Partners, which has some $7.25 billion USD total AUM. That said, a Swedish company, Infrobrick, managed to take second place in the largest and most significant deals in Europe. So, we should not discount Sweden as a country of both investment origins and technological innovation for the global PropTech industry.
Figure 27 shows the top 25 PropTech deals in Europe. As we can see, most of these deals (64% to be precise) were in the Managing category. Just one top deal was in the Living category and, surprisingly, just one top deal was in the Investing category as well. Finally, the Building category took a slightly larger than even share, totalling 28% of the deals. Although the largest deal was completed in the UK, being the aforementioned Zoopla deal, the greatest number of top deals were located in Germany. After Germany and the United Kingdom, four French companies topped the list this year, aided by the significant efforts of top French investors.
When we set aside BpiFrance as an institution, the French investment market looks quite like other leading PropTech investment markets, with However, as the market begins to segment a bit more, there are a significant number of large venture capital firms, which offer promising opportunities for teams of PropTech fundraisers major players being predominantly PE/Buyout firms, such as Ardian ($164 billion USD AUM), Eurazeo ($37.92 billion USD AUM), Capza ($8.34 billion USD), Naxicap Partners ($7.26 billion USD), Keensight Capital ($5.96 billion USD), and Seven 2 ($5.42 billion USD). and eager PropTech disruptors.
Figure 28 shows the top French investors by investor type and assets under management (AUM). Notable, while the aforementioned PE/Buyout firms are leading the top of the pack, there are a couple of spots held by Growth/Expansion firms, such as Credit Mutuel Equity and InfraVia Capital Partners. That said, the bottom half of the top firms represent significant opportunities for PropTech fundraisers. Each of these are venture capital shops, no doubt seeking to quickly expand their AUM. For instance, 360 Capital, Korelya Capital, Axa Venture Partners, Quadrille Capital, and Partech are all significant VC firms in France.
Figure 29 shows the top PropTech deals made by French companies, color coded by their category and organized by their month of completion during the 2023-2024 FY. The Accenta deal in the living category was quite significant ($116.4 million USD). However, the next four of the largest deals were all in the Managing category, with the top deal by far being Stonal ($107.14 million), Europe’s leading AI-powered SaaS platform for real estate data management. The next three following deals were by Nomad Homes ($40.00 million USD), Colonies ($33.21 million USD), and Zefir ($11.48 million USD) respectively. While Nomad Homes aims to simplify the process of buying property, Colonies has created smart living and housing solutions by designing and managing fully furnished properties, and Zefir is the first collective real estate sales platform, thus fundamentally transforming the market through facilitating agent-level cooperation. Overall, we observe that few French deals are made in the Investing category, suggesting that there may be significant opportunity for players in the relatively populated French investing sector to enter the PropTech space, develop new platforms and transform the industry. Additionally, there were just a few companies that made deals in the Building category in the past year in France. Although these deals feature innovative companies like La Fabrik A Yoops, which just received $259,000 USD in VC funding to support their tiny-homes wooden-home solution to abatement homelessness and low income housing supply difficulties in French cities.
In comparison to the French market, the Spanish PropTech market differs in the nature of the largest investors. In Spain, Venture Capital is playing a more significant role than PE/Buyout firms, suggesting that the market is also still in a “growth phase” as opposed to a “maturation and consolidation phase.” Of course, the big news of this year is a recently announced Idealista deal. Idealista is the leading online real estate marketplace based in Spain, having built a platform that provides for the buying selling and renting of properties. Idealista investor EQT (of Sweden) has announced plans to sell its majority stake in Spain’s most notable and prominent online search and sale real estate platform, which they had previously purchased in 2020, in a 2.9 million Euro deal to be facilitated by Morgan Stanley. The private equity firm Cinven plans to acquire a 70% stake of Idealista, while Apax and Oakley advised funds will sell their holdings.
With a rotating stock of over 1.4 million listings, Idealista has ensured they hold a leading position in the Iberian markets and have maintained a strong foothold in Italy. In the wake of two 2020 acquisitions of Miogest and Gestim, two key PropTech software developers, Idealista began to add new features to their website almost every week. They included 3D tours during the global pandemic. They also added Virtual Home Stage, Virtual Tour Search filters, Video Tour features, and more. For agents, the platform allows for perpetual advertising in exchange for a recurring subscription fee. Further, the back-end agent tools of data analytics services and mortgage brokering services have been improved in recent years through the development of more streamlined interfaces backed by more complex, and accurate, algorithmic-drive data processing. Further, EQT, which acquired Idealista in 2020 at a 1.3 Billion Euro evaluation, will retain 18% stake as a minority holder. In effect, the deal has ensured that Idealista has more than doubled their valuation in just four years. However, of course we will only have better data on the final numbers once the deal has been completed.
Figure 30 illustrates the top investors in the PropTech ecosystem in Spain, as measured by their total Assets Under Management (AUM). As we can see, aside from Acciona, which is primarily an Infrastructure investment firm (although they have also completed some deals in the PropTech space) and Aldea Ventures (which is a “Fund of Funds” operation, primarily), and Level Up Ventures (which is a form of venture capital – in that it is a pool of wealth of private individuals awaiting investment in a specified business or businesses), every other major Spanish investment firm is explicitly a Venture Capital outfit. What this suggests is that the Spanish market is ripe for new companies, seeking to court these major venture firms.
Figure 31 shows the top PropTech deals in Spain by category of the company and month the deal was completed during the 2023-2024 fiscal year. Much like France and the United States, the most significant deals are almost all accumulated in the Managing category, with Be Mate ($12.31 million USD) and Aticco Living ($10.87 million USD) being the top overall. The third most significant deal was SAALG Geomechanics ($3.88 million USD) – a Building category company – but then the next five were all managing. Finally, Cubicup ($1.08 million USD) rounds out the top ten with a significant deal in the living category. This is not to say that there are not innovative and inspirational Spanish companies working in the living, investing, or building space. For instance, Nidus Labs is an AI-powered web application that automates building design processes and optimizes the number of housing units for a development, maximizing return on investment.
The German PropTech market offers some interesting comparisons to the American, French, and Spanish markets. Much like the Spanish market, Venture Capital plays a significant role. While there is at least one PE/Buyout in the top investors, PE/Buyout oriented firms don’t play nearly as significant a role when compared to the French or American markets
Figure 32 shows the top PropTech investors in the German PropTech sector by their investor type and organized by those firms with the most Assets Under Management. The largest investor by AUM is a Family Office in Germany (Franz Haniel & Cie), while a Limited Partnership (DEVK Rückversicherungs-und Beteiligungs) and an asset manager (Deutsche Invest Capital Partners) take the number three and four spots, respectively. However, Venture Capital firms take up more than half of the top twenty spots and are relatively evenly distributed among the top places in the count. Further, Vorwerk Ventures is also a form of venture firm, albeit an explicitly corporate venture office.
Figure 33 shows the top PropTech deals in the Germany market by category and organized by the month the deal was completed during the 2023-2024 fiscal year. Much like the French, Spanish, and American markets, the Managing category deals made up a significant share of the market. Yet only two of the top five deals were in the Managing category. Still, they were quite significant in size, when compared to the top deals of the French and Spanish markets, with the real estate firm Sprengnetter – a firm that specializes in valuation services, software development, and more – raising $85.62 million USD, and HABYT – a company that offers flexible housing in 25 global cities, including private and shared apartments, across Europe and Asia – raising $42.60. At the same time, the Building category in Germany outperforms those of France and Spain, as three of the top five deals were in the Building category, as Shuttfilx – a company that connects contractors with materials providers and disposal services – ecoworks – a company using AI to solve energy efficiency – and Klarx – a company that provides digital solutions to source construction machines – raised $47.80 million, $43.50 million, and $26.06 million respectively. However, there were only a few deals in the Living category and almost no deals in the investing category in the past year, suggesting that the Germany PropTech market might also be ripe for new companies to break into the investment space with new technologies, as they are likely to have few competitors in the fundraising space for startups.
The dynamics of the ProPTech ecosystem in Asia are similar in several ways, when compared to several other markets. For instance, when we look at assets under management (AUM), sovereign wealth funds hold the largest slots, like in France, where BpiFrance reigns supreme. However, when we examine dry powder resources, venture firms emerge at the head of the pack, much like the American market. In the past, Israel and other markets, such as Turkey and Iran, or countries in the Arabian Peninsula, showed significant activity. However, few deals were completed in Western Asia this year. The situation contrasts with the activity further eastward.
Figure 34 shows the raw deal count of PropTech deals in Asia in the 2023-2024 fiscal year. Japan (65), India (60), South Korea (51) and China (51) were virtually balanced in the number of deals completed in the past year, while Singapore (21), and Indonesia (13) came in fifth and sixth. The Philippines (7), Malaysia (6), Hong Kong (6), Vietnam (5), and Bangladesh (4) made up a second tier of active markets, while Pakistan (2), Thailand (2), Azerbaijan (1), and Kazakhstan (1) made up a third tier. However, the largest investors who are breaking into the PropTech space, as measured by assets under management are not in Japan, China, or South Korea, as one might expect, but actually in Singapore, Southeast Asia’s gateway between the South China Sea in the East and the India Ocean to the west.
Figure 35 shows the top 20 investors in Asia by their type, location, and AUM for the 2023-2024 fiscal year. The top two investors by AUM are Sovereign Wealth Funds (GIC, Singapore and Temasek Holdings) located in Singapore. The next two spots are held by an asset manager (Mitsubishi UFJ Trust and Banking) and a corporate venture capital firm (CAC Capital), both located in Japan. The limited partner, Ping An Trust of China – an insurance firm – took the number five spot, while the next two spots were taken by two South Korean firms, Shinhan Asset Management (an asset manager firm), and Korea Development Bank (an investment bank). While Tokio Marine Asset Management (a limited partnership headquartered in Japan) took the number eight spot, two venture capital firms rounded out the top ten, one from South Korea (ES Investor) and one from China (Shenzhen Capital Group). However, when we shift our lenses to examine dry powder, venture capital plays an even more significant role.
Figure 36 shows the top 20 investors in Asia by type, location, and their dry powder. As we can see, Venture Capital firms make up twelve of the top 20 slots, just as they did in Germany. However, it is also the case that when we compare to the European region, said firms are rather dispersed by their country of headquarters location. Yet, in Europe we would expect all the top investors to essentially be in the United Kingdom, and we know that the capitalization of the market in the Asia Pacific is much more broadly dispersed. For instance, while the top Venture players by Dry powder, being Shenzhen Capital Group (China) and Peak XV Partners (formerly Sequoia Capital India and SEA) are located in the largest countries by population in the region, most of the rest are evenly distributed between South Korea, China, and Japan.
Figure 37 shows the top ten PropTech deals in Asia by country, category, and amount for the 2023-2024 fiscal year. The largest deals were in China, including the Wanda Commercial Management deal and the Zoomlion deal. After Zoomlion and Wanda Commercial Management, the largest deals in Asia during the 2023-2024 fiscal year was completed by Infra Market. Infra Market is a developer of a massive, efficient, online procurement marketplace designed to serve the real estate and building materials industries. Their centralized platform aggregates client demands, connecting them with their supply chain, while creating affordable credit options, and establishing efficient logistics for delivery and tracking. They have established a presence in 22 of 28 states in India, have more than 100 dedicated manufacturing units and operate more than four thousand individual retail locations, along with more than 25 exclusive brand outlets. They are transforming the ecosystem by leveraging technology and scaling innovation. Additionally, they operate the country’s only ISO-certified world-class R&D center. Infra Market completed three deals during the year, including an undisclosed amount of debt financing in September, with details of that deal yet to be released. However, they also completed a deal raising $150 million USD of debt financing earlier in the fiscal year and even more recently, they raised a rather significant $50 million in venture funding from LIQUiDITY Group – the world’s leading AI-driven direct lender – and Mars Growth Capital – the Singapore-based investment firm that focuses on debt and growth equity in Europe and the Asia-Pacific – on May 28th, 2024, putting their pre-money valuation at $2.55 billion USD.
