Technology

Google is adding a third data center to its presence in Singapore in response to continued internet growth in Southeast Asia.

Itbeen three years since it added a second center in Singapore, and during that time the company estimates that something in the region of 70 million people across Southeast Asia have come online for the first time. That takes the region to over 330 million internet users, but with a population of over 650 million, thereplenty more to come.

The local data centers don&t exclusively serve theirimmediate proximity — Asia data centers can handle U.S. traffic, and likewise — but adding more local capacity does help Google services, and companies that run their business on Googlecloud, run quicker for internet users in that specific region. So not only is it good for locals, but itimportant for Googlebusiness, which counts the likes ofSingapore Airlines, Ninjavan, Wego, Go-Jek and Carousell as notable cloud customers.

The search giant also operates a data center in Taiwan. The company had planned to augment Taiwan and Singapore with a center in Hong Kong, but that project was canned in 2013due to challenges in securing real estate.

Google opened its first Singapore data center in 2011, and this newest facility will take it to around$850 million spent in Singapore to date, the company confirmed, and to over $1 billionwhen including Taiwan.

Electric scooter startup Bird, the one worth $2 billion, is going international. This does not come as a surprise given TechCrunchJune report that Bird was looking to expand to Europe. Today, Bird is launching a pilot program in Paris to see how the electric scooter service operates in a city with more than two million people.

&Paris is very forward-thinking on solving congestion issues and is one of the cities thatdealing with the most congestion and pollution,&Bird Head of Europe, the Middle East and Africa Patrick Studener told TechCrunch.

Bird is also gearing up to deploy some scooters in Tel Aviv, where the company says itchatting with Tel Aviv University and some municipalities about making something work in those areas, Studener said. In Tel Aviv, Bird will charge 5 shekels to start and then 50 agorot per minute.

As Bird expands to international markets, itworth noting that competitor Lime has operated its bikes and scooters outside of the U.S. for quite some time. Last December, Lime brought its bikes to a number of European cities and then, in June, Lime brought its scooters to Paris. Lime also recently raised a $335 million round and teamed up with transportation behemoth Uber.

In Paris, Bird scooters will cost €1 to start followed by €0.15 per minute, which is exactly how much Lime charges. Bird says Paris city officials know the company is planning to deploy about 100 scooters in the city. But this isn&t an official partnership of sorts, Studener said.

&In both cities we&ve started conversations at the national and city levels with officials,& Studener said. &Our approach is to be very collaborative. Almost every city that I&m speaking to, their north star is very much aligned with our north star — and thatreducing car ownership.&

Since launching last November in Santa Monica, Calif., Bird hasn&t always had the best relationships with city regulators. Upon deploying some scooters in Santa Monica, the city filed criminal complaints against Bird for the companyfailure to obtain a vendor permit. Fast forward to June, and the city implemented a pilot program to impose some regulations on scooter companies like Bird, Lime and others.

Studener and the rest of the European team is based in Amsterdam, though, Bird has not yet deployed its scooters in the Dutch city. As head of EMEA, Studener has his eyes on a number of markets but for this week, he is focused on &going from just being in the U.S. to going internationally. Thatstep one.&

In response to a question about Africa, Studener said Bird is still evaluating which African markets would be ripe for Bird scooters.

He said, &I definitely am keen to get that solution there as well because there is especially a very young and innovative population there that are very quick to adopt new solutions.&

One of the fascinating things about watching an emerging startup ecosystem is that it isn&t just companies that are scaling, the very VC firms that feed them are growing themselves, too. Thatperhaps best embodied byGolden Gate Ventures, a Singapore-based firm founded by three Silicon Valley entrepreneurs in 2011 which is about to close a huge new fund for Southeast Asia.

Golden Gate started out with a small seed investment fund before raising a second worth $60 millionin 2015. Now it is in the closes stages of finalizing a new $100 million fund, which has completed a first close of over $65 million in commitments, a source with knowledge of discussions told TechCrunch.

A filing lodged with the SEC in June first showed the firmintent to raise $100 million. The source told TechCrunch that a number of LPs from Golden Gateprevious funds have already signed up, including Naver, while Mistletoe, the firm run by SoftBank Chairman Masayoshi Sonbrother Taizo, is among the new backers joining.

Golden Gateexisting LP base also includes Singapore sovereign fund Temasek, Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin, and South KoreaHanwha.

A full close for the fund is expected before the end of the year.

The firm has made over 40 investments to date and its portfolio includes mobile classifieds service Carousell, automotive sales startup Carro, real estate site 99.co, and payment gateway Omise. TechCrunch understands that the firminvestment thesis will remain the same with this new fund. When it raised its second fund, founding partner Vinnie Lauria told us that Golden Gate had found its match at early-stage investing and it will remain lean and nimble like the companies it backs.

One significant change internally, however, sees Justin Hall promoted topartner at the fund. He joins Lauria, fellow founding partner Jeffrey Paine, and Michael Lints at partner level.

Hall first joined Golden Gate in 2012 as an intern while still a student, before signing on full-time in 2013. His rise through the ranks exemplifies the growth and development within Southeast Asiastartup scene over that period — it isn&t just limited to startups themselves.

The Golden Gate Ventures team circa 2016 — it has since added new members

With the advent of unicorns such as ride-sharing firms Grab and Go-Jek, travel startup Traveloka, and e-commerce companies like Tokopedia, Southeast Asia has begun to show potential for homegrown tech companies in a market that includes over 650 million consumers and more than 300 million internet users. The emergence of these companies has spiked investor interest, which provides the capital that is the lifeblood for VCs and their funds.

Golden Gate is the only one raising big. Openspace, formerly NSI Ventures, is raising $125 million for its second fund, Jungle Ventures is said to be planning a $150 million fund, and SingaporeGolden Equator and Korea Investment Partners have a joint $88 million fund,while Temasek-linked Vertex closed a record $210 million fund last year.

Growth potential is leading the charge but at the same time funds are beginning to focus on realizing returns for LPs through exits, which is challenging since there have been few acquisitions of meaningful size or public listings out of Southeast Asia so far. But, for smaller funds, the results are already promising.

Data from Prequin, which tracks investment money worldwide, shows that Golden Gatefirst fund has already returned a multiple of over 4X, while its second is at 1.3 despite a final close in 2016.

Beyond any secondary sales — it is not uncommon for early-stage backers to sell a minority portion of equity as more investment capital pours in — Golden Gateexits have included the sale of Redmart to Lazada (although not a blockbuster), Pricelineacquisition of Woomoo, Lineacquisition of Temanjalanand the sale ofMapan (formerly Ruma) to Go-Jek.