Author: TechNode Global Staff

Malaysian Central Bank, World Bank announce initiatives to enable financial sector to support nature-positive outcomes

Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) and the World Bank have announced two key initiatives to enable the financial sector to support nature-positive outcomes. The two initiatives are financial risks assessment guide for Malaysian financial institutions and businesses to assess nature-related risks and impacts; as well as private capital mobilization for nature-based…

Singapore skyline SGX SPAC

ACP, IFC, MAS and Temasek establish green investments partnership in Asia

Allied Climate Partners (ACP), International Finance Corporation (IFC), the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and Temasek announced today the intent to establish a green investments partnership to address climate finance gaps and increase the bankability of green and sustainable projects in Asia, with an initial focus on Southeast Asia.

Alibaba Cloud open-sources more LLMs with diverse sizes and multimodal features

Alibaba Cloud has open-sourced two large language models (LLM), Qwen-72B and Qwen-1.8B, the 72-billion-parameter and 1.8-billion-parameter versions of its proprietary foundation model Tongyi Qianwen, on its artificial intelligence (AI) model community ModelScope, and the collaborative AI platform Hugging Face.

Malaysian agritech startup Qarbotech lands $700,000 seed funding

Qarbotech, a Malaysia-based agritech startup, announced Monday that it has raised $700,000 in seed funding and grants. The round was led by multi-stage venture capital firm, 500 Global, and includes innovation grants from the Temasek Foundation for winning the Climate Impact Innovations Challenge 2023, and Khazanah Nasional’s Dana Impak for winning the…

MAS launches world’s first multi-sector transition taxonomy

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has on Monday launched the Singapore-Asia Taxonomy for Sustainable Finance (Singapore-Asia Taxonomy) – which sets out detailed thresholds and criteria for defining green and transition activities that contribute to climate change mitigation across eight focus sectors.

Indonesian construction technology company Gravel raises $14M from prominent investors

Gravel, the Indonesia-based construction technology company, has raised $14 million to date from investors. The investors include New Enterprise Associates (NEA); Weili Dai, Co-Founder Marvell Technology Group; Lip-Bu Tan, Executive Chairman of Cadence Design System and Chairman of Walden International; SMDV; East Ventures; along with other strategic…

Singapore’s Igloo closes $36M Pre-Series C fundraise with 50 percent valuation increase

Singapore-based insurtech Igloo has on Monday announced that it has closed a $36 million Pre-Series C funding round. Global investment firm Eurazeo, through its insurtech fund backed by the insurer BNP Paribas Cardif, led the investment.

Axiata concludes sale of Ncell, exits Nepal

Malaysian multinational telecommunications conglomerate Axiata Group Berhad has announced that it had entered into an unconditional sale and purchase agreement with Spectrlite UK Limited for the sale of Reynolds Holding Limited which owns approximately 80 percent equity stake in Ncell Axiata Limited (Ncell).

Gogoro launches smartscooters and battery swapping in the Philippines

Gogoro Inc., a Taiwan-based technology leader in battery-swapping ecosystems that enable sustainable mobility solutions for cities, has announced the commercial launch and availability of its smartscooters and battery swapping ecosystem in Manila, the capital of the Philippines.

New report reveals $330B/year opportunity in emerging market green investments

Dozens of green technologies are now lower cost than incumbent technologies across the emerging world, sparking a wave of new green investments that could potentially reach $330B per year over the next decade and spur green development, said a report on Thursday.