South Korean Government, NH Bank and OurCrowd to Establish $80 Million Israel-Korea Fund for DeepTech Investments

The bilateral fund is targeting ~25-30 Korean and Israeli venture investments in key sectors including automotive, cybersecurity, digital health, robotics, semiconductors, robotics and quantum computing.

 OurCrowd, Israel’s most active venture investor, was selected by the South Korean government to co-manage a bilateral investment fund that will invest in startups in both countries. The fund’s target is $80 million, $48 million of which has already been raised by the Korean partners of the fund: NH Venture Investment and K-Growth. OurCrowd is currently raising funds from its over 240K registered investors worldwide.

The bilateral fund will invest in ~25-30 startups in both countries that focus in core technology sectors, such as semiconductors, robotics, automotive, quantum computing, cybersecurity, digital health, and more.

The fund combines strong partners with access to Korean conglomerates and $48M in funds already committed. It is backed by Korea Growth Investment Corporation (K-Growth), an agency of the Korean government that invests policy funds to achieve strategic objectives, on behalf of the Korean Ministry of Trade Industry and Energy (MOTIE). The fund is jointly managed by NH Venture Investment and OurCrowd General Partner as co-GPs.

K-Growth has committed $32M to the fund, as one of the largest financial agencies in Korea, handling most of the government’s investments. This Korea-Israel venture fund will be one of its largest international fund Investments and is formally known as the NH-OC Global Open Innovation fund.

NH Venture Investment and its affiliate companies have committed $16M to the fund.  It is the venture arm of NongHyup Financial Group, which is among the Top 5 financial groups in South Korea and has total assets exceeding $400B.

Jon Medved, CEO of OurCrowd, said, “The establishment of the Israel-Korea bilateral fund with the backing of the South Korean government is wonderful news for Israeli high-tech. South Korea is looking at Israeli innovation to establish its position in the industries of the future that it strives to lead by the end of the decade and beyond. Therefore, apart from the fund’s investments, Israeli DeepTech companies will receive direct access to the South Korean industrial giants and will be able to forge collaborations on a global scale, including in the Asia-Pacific markets. South Korean startups on the other hand will benefit by exposure to Israel’s deep global connections to leading venture capital investors, entrepreneurs and family offices which will accelerate their access to foreign tech innovation ecosystems and much needed capital. “

Kim Hyun Jin, CEO of NH Venture Investment, said “K-Growth has established this fund to support the global expansion of Korean companies through open innovations with global high-tech enterprises such as innovative Israeli companies. We expect to find Israeli innovation through OurCrowd’s extensive Israeli and Global network, to collaborate with Korean high-tech startups to grow together through this fund.“

South Korea’s economy is the 13th largest in the world and the fourth largest in Asia. Its gross domestic product grew by 4.1% in 2021. South Korea is also the 5th largest manufacturing power in the world after China, the United States, Japan, and Germany, and the world’s #2 investor in R&D as a percentage of GDP (#1 in this category is Israel).

Credit:OurCrowd