BlueRun Ventures Quarterly Investment & Financing Roundup | 2023 Q3

Every quarter, we round up the latest funding news from BlueRun Ventures' portfolio companies.

In Q3 2023, BlueRun Ventures had 7 publicly disclosed financing events, spanning hard tech, AI, and consumer electronics. Four were new investments, and three were follow-on rounds.

If you're interested in any of these projects or would like to join their teams, feel free to reach out via email: china@lanchiventures.com

New Investments

Pioneer in Intelligent Heavy-Industry Robotics

Deerobot Announces Tens of Millions of RMB in Angel Funding

Solely invested by BlueRun Ventures

Company Profile: Founded in 2022, Deerobot has leveraged its team's accumulated expertise in heavy-industry processes and technical capabilities to develop standardized products including intelligent loading/unloading workstations, sorting workstations, bevel-cutting workstations, and grinding workstations. The company has also built mature algorithms in data perception, point cloud processing, and robot trajectory planning. Its products and technology have already been deployed at leading enterprises in military, aviation, nuclear, construction machinery, and wind power equipment — delivering strong benchmark demonstrations. In the second half of 2023, Deerobot expects to expand both its product range and volume, reaching more top-tier customer factories.

BlueRun's Take: The Deerobot team brings a product-oriented mindset and deep understanding of heavy-industry commercial dynamics, with top-tier international heavy-industry factory experience and full-stack lighthouse factory expertise. Building on vision and control algorithms, the team creates unmanned intelligent work cells and production lines for heavy-industry clients. We are highly bullish on the diverse needs of heavy-industry customers and the broader trends toward digitalization and flexible manufacturing.

Emerging Consumer Electronics Brand

oladance Closes Multi-Million-Dollar Angel Round

Led by BlueRun Ventures

Company Profile: oladance is an innovation-driven consumer electronics brand co-founded in 2019 by former BOSE executive Haoqian Li alongside multiple BOSE engineers. As a global pioneer in open-ear audio, innovation is the brand's driving force. In 2021, oladance globally introduced the OWS (Open Wearable Stereo) concept, creating an entirely new wearable device category and launching its first-generation products in 2022. The products quickly gained traction worldwide with their imperceptible fit, open-ear design, speaker-grade sound quality, and ultra-long battery life — earning Amazon's 2022 Innovation Brand recognition. Revenue is projected to exceed 1 billion RMB in 2024.

BlueRun's Take: The oladance team brings top-tier international product development and operations experience. They have distinctive insights into industry trends and a proven track record of building hit products. Their original, highly scalable OWS category system combines high comfort with premium audio quality — receiving market feedback on par with international first-tier brands. As oladance's angel round lead investor, BlueRun believes the company will continue building blockbuster products based on open-ear audio technology and explore novel interactive possibilities for headphones.

eVTOL Aircraft R&D and Manufacturer

ZeroG Aircraft Industry Closes Nearly 100 Million RMB Strategic Round

BlueRun Ventures Continues to Add to Its Position

Company Profile: Founded in March 2021, ZeroG focuses on eVTOL aircraft R&D and manufacturing. With a vision to build the third transportation ecosystem on Earth, the company is the only known Chinese startup simultaneously developing multi-rotor, compound-wing, and tilt-rotor configurations.

BlueRun's Take: The ZeroG team has leading technical expertise in electric take-off and landing aircraft. Their deep experience in eVTOL manufacturing, testing, and delivery enables them to continuously roll out innovative products. This is a team with both technical strength and commercial acumen. BlueRun Ventures believes ZeroG will play a significant role in leading aviation's electrification wave and helping China build an integrated, multi-dimensional transportation system.

Ophthalmic AR/VR Medical Device Company

Ruisi Technology Closes 100 Million RMB+ Series A+ Round

BlueRun Ventures Continues to Add to Its Position

Company Profile: Founded in 2017, Ruisi Technology has been deeply focused on myopia prevention and control for children and adolescents since its inception. Under the leadership of Chief Scientist Professor Ningli Wang (CPPCC National Committee member, Academician of the International Academy of Ophthalmology, former Director of the Chinese Medical Association's Ophthalmology Branch), co-inventor of the company's core distance-image screen technology, and Chief Optical Advisor Professor Yongtian Wang (CPPCC National Committee member, Distinguished Professor at Beijing Institute of Technology's School of Optoelectronics, Director of the Beijing Engineering Research Center of Mixed Reality and Advanced Display), Ruisi launched its flagship product: the myopia-prevention distance-image screen. Through deep collaboration with Beijing Tongren Hospital and the National Engineering Research Center of Ophthalmology, the company combines top-tier medical expertise with cutting-edge optical technology to create a powerful tool that transforms how children and adolescents read — and helps prevent myopia.

BlueRun's Take: The Ruisi team has a rare interdisciplinary background spanning XR optical design, ophthalmic prevention science, innovative AI algorithms, digital therapeutics, clinical trials, and regulatory certification. Grounded in the underlying mechanisms of myopia formation, the team prioritizes efficacy above all, originally defining an entirely new product category while continuously optimizing user experience and product performance. We are highly bullish on the trend toward digitalized, personalized myopia prevention and control.

Follow-On Funding Events

Full-Stack Intelligent Driving Solution Provider

Machenike Closes 100 Million RMB+ Series B+ Round

BlueRun Ventures led its Pre-A round and participated in its Series A

Company Profile: Founded in 2018, Machenike is dedicated to deeply integrating AI and automotive engineering to liberate human drivers and transform the future of transportation. As a full-stack autonomous driving solution provider, the company has fully self-developed automotive-grade autonomous driving computing platforms, complete software algorithms, and full system integration capabilities. It delivers customized, high-performance intelligent driving solutions tailored to diverse customer needs, enabling L1-L4 intelligent driving across the full development cycle.

Autonomous Unmanned Transport Solution Provider

Mooe Robot Closes 100 Million RMB+ Series B2 Round

BlueRun Ventures invested in its Series B rounds

Company Profile: Founded in 2016, Mooe Robot (Mooe Robot) is a robotics company leading the unmanned transformation of industrial vehicles worldwide, with its autonomous forklifts and solutions already ranking among the top market share in the industry. This funding round will further solidify Mooe's position as a leader in express logistics and industrial unmanned transport robotics. The proceeds will primarily fund new product R&D, overseas market expansion, and team growth.

AI Company

Xinchen AI Receives Strategic Investment from Talking Tom

BlueRun Ventures led its angel round and continued to add in subsequent rounds

Company Profile: Established in July 2021, Xinchen AI focuses on large model research and applications. Founder Zhenzhong Lan joined Westlake University in 2020 as head of the Deep Learning Lab and PhD advisor, after serving as a research scientist at Google and as first author of the lightweight large model ALBERT. On July 9, marking its second anniversary, Xinchen AI officially launched its self-developed general-purpose large model — "Xihu Large Model." At the model launch, Lan stated: "Build a general-purpose large model with both high IQ and EQ, creating AI that accompanies 1 billion people."

** ▶ More to Explore ◀**

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Originating in Silicon Valley, BlueRun Ventures was established in 2005 as a venture capital firm focused on early-stage startups.

Today, BlueRun Ventures manages multiple USD and RMB dual-currency funds in China, with assets under management exceeding 15 billion RMB — making it one of the largest early-stage funds in the country. The firm invests primarily at Pre-A and Series A stages across technology, consumer, and healthcare, with nearly 200 portfolio companies including Li Auto, Waterdrop, QingCloud, Guazi, Qudian, Ganji.com, Energy Monster, Gaussian Robotics, Songguo Mobility, Yuntu Semiconductor, Machenike, CloudWhiz Intelligence, AnchNet, BioMap, and more.

BlueRun Ventures has been ranked #1 on Zero2IPO's "China's Top 30 Early-Stage Investment Institutions," #1 on ChinaVenture's "China's Best Early-Stage Venture Capital Institutions TOP30," and named among Preqin's Top 10 globally consistent high-return VC fund managers.

The firm has also received consecutive recognition from Forbes China, 36Kr, Cyzone, Caixin Media, CBNweekly, Jiemian, and other media outlets for honors including "China's Best Early-Stage Institution of the Year," "China's Top Venture Capital Firm," "Most Founder-Friendly Early-Stage Institution of the Year," and "Most Influential Early-Stage Institution of the Year."