SoftBank Group Corp’s Vision Fund is seeking to invest almost $1 billion in SenseTime Group Ltd, a Chinese facial recognition technology developer, Bloomberg reported.
The fund and SenseTime are finalising the terms of the deal and the details could still change, Bloomberg reported here citing sources.
SenseTime in May raised $620 million in a round of funding from Fidelity International, Hopu Capital, Silver Lake and Tiger Global, and $600 million in April led by Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.
According to the report, SoftBank would join some of the biggest names in technology and investment if the deal goes ahead. Qualcom backed SenseTime last year while Alibaba Group Holding and Temasek Holdings joined April’s $600 million funding round. Fidelity International, Silver Lake and Tiger Global Management took part in a June financing that raised $620 million and boosted its valuation to more than $4.5 billion.
More than facial recognition and identity verification, SenseTime is pushing into autonomous driving and augmented reality.
