The fund has an annual budget of $400,000 and will complement two other schemes under the university Chancellor’s Fund for Innovation and Collaboration.

Epam Systems will lead the first $15m close of blockchain-powered regional VC vehicle Go Philly Fund, which is reportedly aiming to raise $50m in total.

Sojitz has contributed to venture firm 3one4 Capital's latest fund, which has raised $21m of a targeted $50m to invest in the firm's portfolio companies at a later stage.

SoftBank Vision Fund has reportedly got to the halfway point of its $98.6bn allocation and is expected to run out of capital in the next 18 months.

SoftBank is reportedly considering a Latin American fund that would be sized in the billions of dollars, in addition to leading a $149m round for Brazil-based Gympass.

BBG Ventures, which was founded by AOL and is now funded by Verizon Media, is reportedly seeking external commitments for its next fund.

General Electric’s corporate venturing unit is launching a content portal called Flux to help companies overcome barriers to diversity and inclusiveness.

Japanese conglomerate Sojitz has formed a $33m fund that will be managed by venture firm Fenox Venture Capital, already an investment partner for Sega Sammy and Aisin.

Partech Africa has achieved a final close of $143m with limited partners including Orange, Edenred, JCDecaux, Bertelsmann, L’Oréal, Axian Group and Texaf.

In May last year, Severstal announced the launch of Severstal Ventures – a corporate venture fund that would invest directly as well as through other funds in advanced materials and associated technologies, in Russia and abroad.