Sumitomo Dainippon Pharma, Dai-ichi Life ans SBI all invested in a $17.7m round for robotics devloper Meltin MMI, after a $2.1m series A last year.

Alibaba is set to invest $288m in the alcoholic drinks retailer at a time when consumer demand for wine and spirits is rapidly growing in China.

Smart projector and TV manufacturer Holatek has attracted $86.5m in series D funding from a consortium led by Alibaba that featured the newly unveiled 36Kr Fund.

The Csiro Innovation Fund has invested $890,000 in RapidAim, co-founded by three Csiro researchers, to support a trial of a fruit fly monitoring system.

Tencent and existing backer Nio Capital both invested as autonomous driving software developer Momenta took its overall funding to $200m.

The eSports team manager has added series B funding to a 2017 series A backed by WWE, FunPlus, Beverly Hills Sports Council and UTA Ventures.

Men's styling and fashion e-commerce platform Thread has now raised $40m altogether, having secured funding from H&M Co:Lab among others.

Amgen has invested $66m in genetic sequencing system provider Oxford Nanopore, increasing its latest funding round to $206m.

The food ordering platform has reportedly drawn up a term sheet for a $900m primary and secondary round led by Naspers and backed by Tencent.

Al Tayyar and Rakuten are reportedly among the existing investors that provided $200m for on-demand ride platform Careem at a $2bn valuation.