On September 7th 2021, ShopUp announced the successful completion of its series B round private placement of USD 75 million. CICC acted as the sole financial adviser to ShopUp for this series B private placement. This round of funding is led by Valar Ventures, a US based VC fund backed by Paypal co-founder Peter Thiel, and attracted strong investor interest. The oversubscribed round also received investments from Prosus Ventures (formerly Naspers Ventures), the venture investment arm of Prosus, along with existing investors Flourish Ventures, Sequoia Capital India, and VEON Ventures. 

This transaction marks the largest series B funding for a B2B commerce platform in South Asia and brings ShopUp’s total funding to over USD 110 million, making it the most well-funded start-up in Bangladesh. The transaction also marked the introduction of marquee global investors to Bangladesh – this being the first ever investment into Bangladesh by both the blue-chip investors, Valar Ventures and Prosus.

About ShopUp: ShopUp is Bangladesh’s largest and the fastest growing B2B commerce technology platform for small neighborhood mom-and-pop retailers. ShopUp provides full-stack B2B platform offering sourcing, distribution, and buy now pay later (BNPL) solutions to traditional retailers, as well as last-mile logistics to eCommerce companies. 

As the sole financial adviser to ShopUp, CICC was exclusively responsible for the entire capital raise process and assisted ShopUp at every step – from designing the process to valuation benchmarking to due diligence to eventually negotiating the transaction documents. CICC crafted a gripping investment story to educate international investors on Bangladesh’s macro-economy, retail market and ShopUp's positioning. Through an extensive marketing effort, CICC generated strong interest from international investors, making the process extremely competitive and resulting in oversubscription of the round, within a month from launching the process.

Assisting ShopUp in the successful capital raising transaction highlights CICC’s active aim and determination to be a global partner to its clients and a world-class international investment bank. As a leading investment bank with “China Roots, International Reach”, CICC will continue to utilize its capital raising expertise as well as its seamless cooperation of onshore and offshore businesses, to facilitate the cross-border and global transactions, and continue to provide high-quality financial services for more enterprises in the international capital raising market. This transaction serves as the testament to CICC’s active response to “the Belt and Road Initiative”, CICC’s internationalization strategy and also highlights the value-add CICC can bring to global clients and investors.