(Yicai) Jan. 30 -- Shanghai International Group, a large financial holding group owned by the Shanghai municipal government, has established an early-stage hardtech fund that aims to reach a size of CNY1 billion (USD140 million).

The fund was established yesterday in Zhangjiang Science City in Shanghai’s Pudong New Area by SIG, Zhangjiang Science City’s operator Shanghai Zhangjiang Hi-Tech Park Development, and Shanghai Science and Technology Innovation Fund, a tech startup-focused fund set up by SIG in 2017, which will be the operator of the new fund.

With a registered capital of about CNY200 million (USD27.9 million), the new fund will focus on early-stage small-sized hardtech innovative startups and invest no more than CNY10 million (USD1.4 million) each time.

Hardtech startups create breakthrough products and technologies that require huge innovation and are difficult to replicate and imitate. Therefore, the new fund is expected to mainly invest in the integrated circuits, biomedicine, and artificial intelligence industries. It will also focus on fields related to future industries, intelligence, energy, space, and materials.

Investing in early-stage hardtech through the new fund will give full play to the leverage and guidance of state-owned assets, leading capital to support the early incubation of hardtech projects and promoting the coordinated development of Shanghai Science and Technology Innovation Fund, SIG said.

As of the end of last year, Shanghai Science and Technology Innovation Fund had managed over CNY14 billion (USD1.95 billion) worth of funds and invested in 956 projects, with the average valuation of the companies it invested in increasing 94 percent after the investment.

Editor: Futura Costaglione