Goldman sinks S$74.5m in S’pore-based big-data firm

SINGAPORE —Goldman Sachs has made its first foray into big data in Asia by investing the lion’s share of a US$56 million (S$74.5 million) round of funding for Antuit, a Singapore-based data analytics start-up.

The investment illustrates the US bank’s interest in new big-data technology in Asia and the Republic’s emerging role as the region’s hub for a rapidly growing industry that has long been centred around Silicon Valley.

Big data is the capture and analysis of information — whether numbers or social-media output such as tweets and Instagram photos — to discern patterns in human behaviour for commercial purposes, such as targeted online advertising.

The market is dominated by Intel, Qualcomm and Google, but smaller players are emerging, often with the backing of Silicon Valley investors.

Financial institutions, too, are increasingly looking beyond traditional compliance systems to big data and new technology to root out illicit behaviour.

Goldman Sachs has bet on big data in the United States, including investing US$90 million in AvePoint last year and pouring US$100 million the previous year into Applied Predictive Technologies, a cloud-based “predictive analytics” software company.

Antuit, founded less than two years ago, specialises in big-data services for company supply chains as well as sales and marketing operations, and has offices in New York, Seattle, Auckland, Bangalore and Singapore.

The funding for Antuit includes money from Zodius Capital, an India-based investor in enterprise software and mobile Internet firms.

Antuit said the money would be used for “further global expansion through organic growth and acquisitions”. Mr Ankur Sahu, co-head of private equity at Goldman Sachs in Asia, will join the Antuit board.

Mr Arijit Sengupta, chief executive of the start-up, said: “The rapidly growing US$10billion-plus big-data services market is ripe to be organised and consolidated under a market leader. Goldman Sachs … brings us not only capital, but also deep expertise around how to grow into such a company and a global network of corporate relationships.”

Singapore began promoting itself three years ago as Asia’s data hub and the Government expects data analytics to contribute S$1 billion to the city state’s economy by the end of 2017.

In partnership with the National University of Singapore, Antuit is working on a way to more accurately predict movements in the Straits Times technology stock index by analysing data on Singapore’s import and export of technology.

Antuit said this “trade index” would enable companies to make more accurate sourcing and inventory management decisions.

THE FINANCIAL TIMES