Italian luxury apparel manufacturer Moncler has acquired the remaining 30% of high-end sportswear maker Stone Island for $419 million. The two Italian brands will continue to remain separate, autonomous entities, but the acquisition will see the brands share information on how to best capture the American and Asian markets, as well as amplifying their DTC (direct-to-consumer) channels for the new luxury customer. IDG Capital was an early investor in Moncler, which went public in Milan in 2013.

IDG Capital has led a Series C funding round in Lyvgen, a biopharmaceutical firm focused on oncology immunotherapy. Headquartered in Shanghai, Lyvgen develops proprietary medicines and therapies for lung cancer, melanoma and gastrointestinal cancer. The company said that the proceeds of the latest funding will help accelerate the development and Lyvgen expects the innovative drugs can benefit cancer patients soon.

Norway-based web browser Opera launches Dify, an in-browser cashback payments solution and standalone wallet. Dify will offer customers in-browser services such as e-commerce cashback integration when shopping through Opera’s partner websites. With 380 million global active users, the company aims to target the younger generations of “power shoppers” with its new Dify app. IDG Capital joined Opera's pre-IPO financing round.

IDG Capital has led a $390 million Series A funding round in Fenbi Education, an ed-tech startup that provides vocational education online and offline. Founded in 2015, Fenbi serves users who prepare for the civil service entrance test, teachers’ qualification certificate and postgraduate exam. Fenbi said the capital will be used to hire talent as well as to develop its products and technology. As of January, the company had accumulated 48 million registered users and 7 million paid users since its inception.

Pony.ai, an autonomous driving startup based in China and Silicon Valley, has raised a $100 million extension to its last funding round. Pony.ai, founded in 2016, makes an autonomous driving system called PonyAlpha aimed at facilitating driverless operations. The company is now valued at $5.3 billion, up from $3 billion in February 2020. IDG Capital was a seed investor in Pony.ai and also joined a $112 million Series A funding round in 2018.

IDG Capital has led a $300 million financing round in the autonomous driving unit of Didi Chuxing, a leading ride-hailing platform based in China. The company started testing and developing autonomous vehicles in 2016 and has gained open-road testing licenses in California, Beijing, Shanghai and Suzhou. Didi’s autonomous driving unit raised over $500 million in May last year.

Huohua Siwei, a Beijing-based firm providing online education services for children aged 3 to 12, has announced the completion of its series E funding round that raised $400 million in total, as online tutoring grows in popularity. The new funding comes at a time when the company tries to expand beyond its key offerings of online math and science courses by developing multi-disciplinary online classes involving Chinese and English language acquisition. IDG Capital joined Huohua’s Series B+ round, another $15 million funding round in 2018 and its Series D equity financing round in 2019.

Chinese electric carmaker Xpeng has started rolling out its new autonomous highway driving feature called the Navigation Guided Pilot. The feature allows drivers to automatically change lanes, speed up or slow down, overtake cars as well as enter and exit highways. Eligible customers can download the new software via WiFi. The Guangzhou-based company is trying to highlight its software and autonomous driving capabilities as a way to differentiate from domestic rivals. IDG Capital co-led Xpeng's $348 million Series B round in 2018.

Chinese e-cigarette company RELX Technology has debuted on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) under the symbol “RLX”, becoming the first Chinese e-cigarette brand to start public trading. The market value of the NYSE-debuted company reached $45.8 billion on the debut day. Founded in 2018, the Shenzhen-based company has achieved a market share of 62.6% in China, with about 40% gross profit margin. IDG Capital was an investor in RELX Technology.

Norway-based web browser Opera has acquired YoYo Games, the maker of the GameMaker Studio 2 game engine, for $10 million, and it has also launched its Opera Gaming division. GameMaker Studio 2 found its niche as a tool for making 2D games, and it’s being used by people who have very little training in programming skills. “It lowers the barrier to entry for anyone to start making their games,” said Krystian Kolondra, Opera’s executive vice president of browsers. Opera Gaming will focus on expanding Opera’s capabilities and monetization opportunities in the gaming. IDG Capital joined Opera's pre-IPO financing round.

Cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase has acquired Bison Trails, a firm that specializes in building blockchain infrastructure for banks and other companies. Founded in 2018, Brooklyn-based Bison Trails provides infrastructures to help other firms stand up features like nodes, which are intrinsic to the blockchain networks on which a variety of crypto protocols operate. "[The deal] will help drive one of the greatest transformations in finance in the last hundred years and will drive us closer to achieving our mission of creating an open financial system," said Coinbase. IDG Capital was an angel investor in Coinbase in 2013.

NYSE-listed electric vehicle (EV) startup Xpeng has secured a credit line of $1.98 billion from major Chinese financial institutions, including Bank of China, China Construction Bank and Agricultural Bank of China. The agreement will help the Guangzhou-based company expand its manufacturing, sales and services and other operations. As Xpeng’s third largest investor, IDG Capital joined the company’s Series A round and also co-led its Series B round.

News Break, an AI-powered news aggregation app created in 2015 by Mountain View, Calif.-based Particle Media, has raised $115 million in new funding. IDG Capital also participated this round. The round has made News Break “one of the first new unicorns of 2021”. Currently ranked on the 4^th spot in the News category of Apple’s U.S. App Store, News Break is reaching 12 million daily active users. Previously, IDG Capital led News Break's Series A round in 2016 and also joined its Series B round in 2017.News Break, an AI-powered news aggregation app created in 2015 by Mountain View, Calif.-based Particle Media, has raised $115 million in new funding. IDG Capital also participated this round. The round has made News Break “one of the first new unicorns of 2021”. Currently ranked on the 4^th spot in the News category of Apple’s U.S. App Store, News Break is reaching 12 million daily active users. Previously, IDG Capital led News Break's Series A round in 2016 and also joined its Series B round in 2017.

Chinese leading electric vehicle manufacturer NIO has formed a partnership with American semiconductor firm Qualcomm to incorporate Qualcomm’s autonomous driving technologies in NIO’s first flagship sedan — the NIO ET7. The alliance will not only enhance NIO’s premium vehicle with improved driving experiences but also highlight the importance of Qualcomm’s expertise in connectivity and computing to meet the rising demand of autonomous vehicles. Previously, IDG Capital joined NIO's Series B+ funding round. NIO went public on the New York Stock Exchange in 2018.

Shein, a women's fashion e-commerce platform reaching tens of millions of customers worldwide, is challenging more established rivals like Zara by offering a near-endless supply of styles at almost impossible price points. Shein sells exclusively online, operating no brick-and-mortar stores. Its app had topped 100 million downloads and counted over 20 million annual users as of 2019. During 2020, Shein logged almost $10 billion in sales. Previously, IDG Capital joined Shein's Series B round.

Chinese online education platform Yuanfudao has secured another $300 million financing, bringing the overall funding of the company in 2020 to $3.5 billion. This is Yuanfudao’s third funding round this year. Founded in 2012, Yuanfudao offers a range of remote learning products, including live tutoring platform Yuanfudao, Zebra AI Class, online question bank Yuantiku, question searching app Xiaoyuan Souti, and arithmetic problem checking app Xiaoyuan Kousuan. IDG Capital, which first invested in the firm in 2012, is the sole investor who has joined each financing round of Yuanfudao since Series A.