AI startup Laiye raises $42 million in Series C funding

On Feb 24, 2020

Artificial intelligence firm Laiye has raised $42 million in Series C funding, the company announced on Monday. The round comes as Chinese startups scramble for cash amid a new flu-like epidemic that has swept the country.

Why it matters: Fundraising by Chinese startups has this year slumped by around 60% year on year to $1.8 billion. The number of deals has fallen to 168 from 440 at the same time, according to data from consultancy Preqin.

The virus, known officially as Covid-2019, has created uncertainty for startups as investors worry about the short-term effects of the outbreak on China’s economy.
In June, Laiye raised $35 million in a Series B led by cross-border venture capital firm Cathay Innovation.

Details: Laiye’s Series C is co-led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and Lightspeed China Partners, the company said on Monday.

Cathay Innovation and Wu Capital also followed this round. Both first took part in Laiye’s Series B. Microsoft was a lead investor in the company’s Series A.
Laiye focuses on artificial intelligence and chatbots, as well as robotic process automation (RPA), which allows companies to assign repetitive tasks to computers.
The company will use the proceeds of the funding round to focus on recruitment to “strengthen our business and technology,” Laiye CEO Wang Guanchun, said in a statement.
Meanwhile, Weng Jiaqi, former chief technology officer at chatbot developer Emotibot, has joined Liaye as vice president of solution engineering.
The company has been providing community-level government agencies free software to automate calling residents to collect health information and aggregate the data during the Covid-19 epidemic, the company said.

Context: Laiye last year merged with Awesome Technology to launch UiBot, an RPA platform that allows companies to automate rule-based operations that the company claims will “significantly improve operational efficiency,” while decreasing labor costs.