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Aiven Achieves $2B Unicorn Valuation with its Series C Extension

Aiven’s existing investors increase capital investment to double down the company’s exponential growth and global open-source innovation

SINGAPORE – Media OutReach – 26 October 2021 – Aiven, a software company that combines the best open-source technologies with cloud infrastructure, announced a $60M Series C extension at a $2B valuation today, bringing the total Series C round to $160M. This extension brings Aiven’s total funding to date to $210M. The round was co-led by existing investors World Innovation Lab and IVP, and with the participation from Atomico and others. In a testament to the growth and potential Aiven showcases in its capabilities, a number of investors increased their capital commitments to Aiven just seven months after the company’s successful $100 million Series C.

As the latest unicorn of the Nordics, Aiven is experiencing growing revenue of over 100% year on year and aims to continue maximizing its growth in a journey to becoming the global category leader in managed cloud data infrastructure. Aiven currently has more than 230 employees scaling global hubs from Helsinki, reaching Berlin, Boston, Toronto and Sydney. Following the fundraise, the company will expand its reach in the Asia-Pacific region by opening an office in Singapore.

 

The move to expand to a South-East Asian (SEA) is influenced by the high momentum of digital transformation in the region. With more and more investments allocated to digitalization and open source software, the economic growth potential and access to talent are strong, making Singapore a key market for Aiven. Future regional expansion locations include Indonesia and Malaysia.

 

“This is an exciting step for Aiven on our journey and indicates that our team is successfully delivering on our mission to champion open source and make the lives of developers better in all that we do,” said Oskari Saarenmaa, CEO and co-founder at Aiven. “The additional funding from our existing investors will allow us to rapidly expand our global footprint, significantly contribute to the open source community and support the growth of other tech startups.”

In an effort to give back to the open source community, Aiven continues its open source investment with its recently launched open source program office, solely focused on contributing to the projects that are key to Aiven’s customers. Additionally, Aiven will support promising entrepreneurs and launch its own startup program in December. The program participants will get access to Aiven’s expertise and data platform for free for one year.

“IVP originally invested in Aiven in January of 2020 behind a belief that the company’s outstanding product and platform would enable companies of all sizes to manage their exploding data needs easily and efficiently,” said Eric Liaw, General Partner at IVP. “Under Oskari’s leadership, the Aiven team is delivering tremendous value for their customers, and the proof is that the company has more than quadrupled since our original investment and growth is accelerating.”

With Aiven’s fully managed services for popular open source projects like Apache Kafka and Cassandra, OpenSearch, M3, PostgreSQL and more in the public cloud, businesses can enjoy a modern, fully-functional open source data infrastructure globally in minutes. According to a recent IDC whitepaper[1], companies leveraging Aiven’s offerings report a 340% ROI over three years thanks to reduced cost of using open source solutions, increased development team efficiency, as well as increased revenue through enhanced agility and scalability.

For more information on Aiven, visit https://aiven.io/.



[1] Source: IDC Business Value Snapshot, sponsored by Aiven, The Business Value of Aiven Data Cloud, doc #US48198621, August 2021

About Aiven

Headquartered in Helsinki and hubs in Berlin, Boston, Toronto and Sydney, Aiven provides managed open source data technologies, like PostgreSQL, Kafka and OpenSearch, on all major clouds. Through Aiven, developers can do what they do best: create applications. Meanwhile, Aiven does what they do best: manage cloud data infrastructure. Aiven enables customers to drive business results from open source that trigger true transformations far beyond their own backyard. To learn more about Aiven, visit aiven.io and follow @aiven_io on Twitter.

#Aiven

About World Innovation Lab (WiL)

World Innovation Lab (WiL) is a US & Japan-based venture capital firm with capital from governments and leading global corporations in Japan and throughout Asia, including Sony, Suzuki, NTT, KDDI, and 7-Eleven. WiL helps US startups expand to Japan and Asia, and Japanese startups expand globally. With our corporate investors as partners, we invest in digital transformation. WiL direct company investments include Aiven, Asana, Auth0, DataRobot, Kong, MURAL, Sendbird, Wise, and Unqork. In addition to direct investment, WiL invests in exceptional venture funds – both established and emerging. Our mission is to be the bridge between startups and corporates across the globe – starting with Japan and the US. For more, visit wilab.com or twitter.com/wilabcom.

About IVP

Founded in 1980, IVP is one of the premier later-stage venture capital and growth equity firms in the United States. IVP has invested in over 400 companies, 126 of which have gone public. IVP is one of the top-performing firms in the industry and has a 40-year IRR of 43.1%. IVP specializes in venture growth investments, industry rollups, founder liquidity transactions, and select public market investments. IVP investments include such notable companies as Amplitude (AMPL), AppDynamics (CSCO), Attentive, Brex, Coinbase (COIN), Compass (COMP), CrowdStrike (CRWD), Datadog (DDOG), Discord, Dropbox (DBX), GitHub (MSFT), Glossier, Grammarly, HashiCorp, Hims & Hers (HIMS), Hopin, Klarna, LegalZoom (LZ), Looker (GOOGL), Marketo (MKTO), MasterClass, Mindbody (MB), MuleSoft (CRM), Netflix (NFLX), Niantic, Podium, Robinhood (HOOD), Rubrik, Slack (WORK), Snap (SNAP), Supercell (Tencent), Twitter (TWTR), UiPath (PATH), Wise (WISE), ZipRecruiter (ZIP), and Zynga (ZNGA). For more information, visit www.ivp.com or follow IVP on Twitter: @ivp.

Zive One Launched A Complete Customized Gift Service To Help Corporates Create Eye-catching Gifts

HONG KONG SAR – Media OutReach – 26 October 2021 – Nowadays the epidemic has made social distancing becomes the norm. However, according to a research report by Coresight Research, an international market research organization, the corporate gifting market is expected to exceed $242 billion this year. During the depressing days of fighting the epidemic, many companies have shown their appreciation to customers and employees. In order to make corporate gifts more innovative and targeted, Zive One, a Hong Kong gift company, has launched a bespoke corporate gift service. The complete personalized service makes it easy for companies to create gifts that are heart-melting and show the style of a corporate.

To Create Eye-catching Corporate Gifts

As an online gift shop, Zive One also provides popular gifts such as snacks, wines, and tonics, but it specializes in creative and famous gifts from all over the world, including red wine and sparkling wine of well-known brands, dragon’s beard candy that evokes childhood memories, and various novel gifts such as aged chocolate, edible flower lollipops and so on. These innovative gifts are hard to be buried during every gifting carnival, and they may relieve the depression of not being able to travel abroad. The CEO of Zive One said, that in order to avoid producing repetitive boring corporate gifts, they make their effort on providing novel gifts that are captive and meet the more detailed needs of different people. In addition, they will expand the types of gifts, and provide more unique and hilarious gifts.

The Complete Customized Services That Blow Up Brand Waves

In recent years, many companies have launched “gift wars”, such as the beauty calendars of Jo Malone, L’Occitane en Provence, Estee Lauder or other brands,  the Christmas gift box of Very, the music gift box of Xiaomi, the “Great Wall Bricks” of Tencent, and so on. They are not only creative and interesting but also show their distinctive corporate styles, which has successfully attracted the public’s attention. With the increase in the gift-giving behavior of companies, many companies hope to create more distinctive gifts, thus they are longed for a complete customized corporate gift service.

And Zive One is able to meet the need for a completely customized corporate gift service. Companies can not only customize their gift hampers, but also can create the gifts they want from the appearance of a single gift to the packaging of the entire gift box with the techniques of laser engraving, screen printing, metal wire-drawing, and so on. What’s more, some gifts can change their flavor as they want. So far, Zive One only supports mass customization of gifts, but it is a piece of refreshing news for companies for they can customize more distinctive and delightful gifts.

In addition, Zive One also provides self-branding services to help companies build their own brands and create unique or topical products. Nowadays, many brands have launched crossover marketing, such as fried chicken-flavored nail polish of KFC, the perfume of Zippo, beer washing and care products of Carlsberg, etc., created eye-catching products with a wild imagination, and ignited social media. For companies that want to attract more customers, or want to make themselves go viral through topical events, the self-branding services of Zive One will do a lot of help.

 

Simple Steps To Finish Gift Customization and Delivery

The gift customization and delivery services of Zive One are also simple and convenient. The user can select the desired gift, provide recipient information, submit the requirements for gifts and packaging, and confirm the order to finish ordering. Then Zive One will deliver gifts straight to the door of recipients. Users can log in to Zive One’s website at any time to check the delivery of an order. Thus, it spares the complicated processes of designing gifts and the process of logistics.

 

Though corporate gift-giving behavior is growing rapidly and the demand for personalized gifts is also increasing, the quality of gifts is still important for companies. The CEO of Zive One said, “We will adhere to strict inspections of equipment and quality control to ensure the quality of products. In addition, our products are manufactured in the place of origin, so that everyone can enjoy the charm  and the delighting benefits of special goods around the world.”

About Zive One

Zive One is a leading supplier of high-quality gifts, providing self-branding services and complete gift customization services, such as corporate gifts customization, business gifts customization, etc. The goal is to create the best trendy products at reasonable prices. In addition to the quality products, it also provides OEM customized product services and supports Hong Kong companies to build their own brands.

#ZiveOne

Thousands of Undocumented Migrant Laborers Living in Golden Triangle SEZ

Golden Triangle Special Economic Zone in Laos

The Lao Ministry of Labour and Social Welfare is working with Bokeo Province to solve the problem of unlawful labor practices in the Golden Triangle Special Economic Zone.

Xlife Sciences AG is elected as Innovation Partner for Saudi Arabia

ZÜRICH, SWITZERLAND – EQS Newswire – 26 October 2021 – Xlife Sciences AG has signed a strategic partnership with the development organization Peace City World as part of the Vision 2030 future program. Peace City World is the official developer of four Smart Cities in Saudi Arabia and Tunisia as well as part of Vision 2030. The program was launched by the Saudi Crown Prince in 2016 and aims to reduce Saudi Arabia’s dependence on fossil fuels and diversify its economy financially. As part of the partnership, Xlife Sciences will be granted a budget of up to 50 Million US Dollars. The core focus is the establishment of an innovation center and technology transfer for the Smart Cities initiative.

The partnership of Xlife Sciences AG with Vision 2030 takes place in the field of sustainable health and particularly focuses on promoting innovation and technology transfer to the Middle East. Oliver R. Baumann, CEO of Xlife Sciences sees significant potential in the collaboration: “For Xlife, the partnership with Saudi Arabia is a recognition of our work and a step towards more international presence and innovation in our four pillars of technology platforms, biotech, medtech and artificial intelligence.” “Furthermore, by participating in the program, Xlife is significantly expanding its network of relationships and presence in the region. In terms of the program, further license partners for the various technologies may be found, particularly for the exit of project companies and the acceleration of registration processes”, says Baumann.

According to the management of Xlife, the funds of up to 50 Million US Dollars will especially be used for the construction of an innovation center and the further development of smart city technologies. As part of the Smart City Sustainability initiative, Saudi Arabia aims to operate ten cities sustainably in the mid term. Moreover, the funds are also intended to further advance the scaling process of various Xlife project companies.

About Xlife Sciences AG

Xlife Sciences AG is a Swiss company with focus on investing in promising technologies in the life science industry. Xlife Sciences AG is building the bridge from research and development to healthcare markets by supporting researchers and entrepreneurs in positioning, structuring, developing and implementing their concepts. Together with industrial partners or universities, Xlife Sciences AG leads projects through the proof-of-concept phase after an invention disclosure or start-up. Subsequently, the firm focuses on out-licensing or selling the company, often with a combination of a strategic partnership. Xlife Sciences AG offers its investors direct access to the further development of innovative and future-oriented technologies at a very early stage. For more information, please visit: www.xlifesciences.ch

Laos Confirms 770 New Cases of Covid-19 and Three Deaths

Covid-19 Update Vientiane

Laos has recorded 770 new cases of Covid-19 across the country today, with three new deaths recorded.

Fintech the Main Driver of Financial Services Employment Up 45% in Q3 2021 from Q2: Michael Page Indonesia

JAKARTA, INDONESIA – Media OutReach – 26 October 2021 – According to job opportunity data shared by global recruitment specialists Michael Page Indonesia the number of jobs rose in Q3 2021 compared to Q2 led by job positions within Financial Services (up 45%), Digital (up 14%) and Technology (up 13%).

Olly Riches, President Director of Michael Page Indonesia & Philippines

 

Olly Riches, President Director of Michael Page Indonesia & Philippines observes, “As Indonesia continues to enjoy a digital boom, multinational and domestic financial services players are investing heavily into Fintech. This is the key enabler for the Indonesian population to access e-wallets, make online payments and manage all their banking and insurance activities. There is also keen competition between the traditional financial services firms and the new Fintech start ups for Indonesian talent right now which is really driving the healthy hiring activity.”

 

Similarly, the uptick in Digital job opportunities (up 14%) is again led by tech unicorns who initiated growth in Indonesia and is currently being fuelled by changing lifestyles due to the pandemic. “Indonesia is a young population who are savvy with home deliveries and online services which makes it a very compelling demographic for rapid growth in this space. We have seen quite an increase in employment opportunities as well within private equity and venture capital firms for their portfolio businesses, which are often in digital and technology,” Olly Riches continues.

As the population becomes increasingly connected, Indonesians who live in farther out locations now have access to education and healthcare via technology as well. In order to provide these essential services to the large population, Medtech and Edtech have also emerged as one of the key growth areas in order to reach citizens living outside of the major cities.

 

The technology required to deliver on those platforms has also created the 13% rise in job opportunities. “Primarily seen in software development and product engineering, the government push led by President Jokowi to nurture these talents within Indonesia is key to ensuring we maintain a sustainable technology-driven economy and increase the prominence of Indonesia on the world map,” speaks Olly Riches from recent observations.

 

Source: Information procured from Michael Page Indonesia’s proprietary data

 

Employment Led by 11% Quarter on Quarter Rise in Job Opportunities Within Technology: Michael Page Thailand

BANGKOK, THAILAND – Media OutReach – 26 October 2021 – Global recruitment specialists Michael Page Thailand witnessed a marginal 2% quarterly increase in overall job numbers within Q3 2021 as hiring evened out after the surge in the early parts of 2021.

Kristoffer Paludan, Regional Director of Michael Page Thailand

 

With consistent employment demand, Thai professionals with the right combination of technical and behavioural competencies will continue to be in demand and command a higher ratio of salary. Additionally, competition for talented professionals is intensifying and companies are increasingly adopting a candidate-first mentality and paying more attention to the overall candidate experience, to help improve their brand, their process and their overall ability to attract talent.

 

The number of jobs within the Thai Technology sector rose by 11% in Q3 from Q2 2021. “This is partly led by a buoyant tech startup community which is experiencing very healthy private equity and venture capital investments. A resulting demand is seen for professionals skilled in data citation, project and program management as well as software development,” observes Kristoffer Paludan, Regional Director of Michael Page Thailand.

 

Hiring in the Thai Engineering & Supply Chain landscape saw similar levels of heightened activity at a rate of 9% in Q3 2021 compared to Q2. According to Kristoffer Paludan, this upward trend is driven by the significant uplift in food production and packaging, chemical manufacturing as well as electronics and electricals.

 

“We have seen a number of new players entering the Thai market in the above-mentioned sectors. That combined with the expansion of the domestic marketplace has driven the uplift in hiring activity. In addition, the decline in the Thai Baht is fueling the export market which in turn has seen an increase in vacancies across both procurement, supply chain, engineering as well as manufacturing,” comments Kristoffer Paludan.

 

Also earmarked for further growth within Thailand’s employment market is the healthcare industry. Thailand being the second largest healthcare market in SEA accounting for roughly 20% of the region’s healthcare expenditure is in urgent need of a talent infusion across most disciplines. As demand for hiring grows, so will the competition for talent.

 

Source: Michael Page Thailand proprietary data

#MichaelPageThailand

Pacific Oil & Gas Limited Rebrands to Pacific Energy Corporation Limited

SINGAPORE – Media OutReach – 26 October 2021 – Pacific Oil & Gas Limited (PO&G) has announced that it will rebrand its operations to become Pacific Energy Corporation Limited.

 

Ratnesh Bedi, President of Pacific Energy said, “The Pacific Energy name and new logo reflects the next step in our growth strategy dedicated to providing cleaner energy for North American markets and growing Asian economies. Our refreshed branding also creates a platform for new product development and future acquisitions.”

 

Pacific Energy, which is part of the Singapore-based RGE group of companies founded by Sukanto Tanoto in 1973, is an independent energy resources development company focused on helping North America and growing Asian economies meet their increasing energy requirements. The company strategy is to invest, develop, build, own and operate innovative and cost-competitive projects throughout the energy value chain, while maintaining constant attention to its role as a responsible corporate citizen.

 

Established Presence in China


Since 2003, Pacific Energy has taken strategic positions in China’s gas and related power markets. Pacific Energy is one of the first two foreign companies to own interests in liquefied natural gas (LNG) receiving terminals in China. Pacific Energy also successfully built and operates the first 100% foreign-owned combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT) power plant in Xiamen, and owns 70% stake in another CCGT power plant in Wuxi.  Power plants powered by natural gas are more efficient than traditional coal-fired power plants. They can also serve as an effective bridge fuel to meet energy demand when the supply from renewable sources does not provide consistent returns throughout the day.

Growing Presence in Canada


In Canada, Pacific Energy’s exploration and production of gas are conducted through its subsidiary Pacific Canbriam Energy (PCE). Acquired by Pacific Energy in 2019, PCE is a leading exploration and production company focused on finding and developing over-pressured, liquid rich natural gas resources in the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin. Headquartered in Calgary, Alberta, with operations near Fort St. John, British Columbia, PCE differentiates itself from competitors through the quality of its resource and commitment to sustainability.

PCE achieved EO100™ Standard Certification from Equitable Origin in August 2021, signifying PCE’s demonstrated use of innovative and transparent practices to produce some of the world’s most sustainable and responsible natural gas.

 

Pacific Energy is expanding its existing presence in Canada with the Woodfibre LNG Project, a Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) export facility located near Squamish, British Columbia, about 70km from Vancouver. The Woodfibre LNG Project has obtained a licence to export LNG for 40 years. The project has also received environmental approvals from the federal and provincial governments as well as the local Indigenous people:  the Squamish Nation. By using hydroelectric power for the refrigeration process, Woodfibre LNG will be one of the most innovative and cleanest LNG facilities in the world.

 

Bedi added, “We believe there is a distinct opportunity for Pacific Energy to expand as a competitive and sustainable gas-based value chain business. Economies around the world which have been hit hard by the impact of the global pandemic are rebounding at a rapid pace.  At the foundation of any economic recovery is ‘energy’.  We take great pride in providing clean energy to North American and growing Asian economies.” 

About Pacific Energy

Pacific Energy, which is part of the Singapore-based RGE group of companies, is an independent energy resources development company focused on helping North America and growing Asian economies meet their increasing energy requirements. The company strategy is to invest, develop, build, own and operate innovative and cost-competitive projects throughout the energy value chain, while maintaining constant attention to our role as a responsible corporate citizen.

#PacificEnergy