Co-managed by Innoh Associates, the CVC unit will operate for seven years and back strategic areas such as marketing, retail, energy and AI.

The $11.4m fund will be co-managed by M&A consultancy Paradigm Shift, and it is part of the funeral firm’s 70th anniversary business plan.

The Brazilian beauty and wellness group’s CVC unit will target seed-stage opportunities in circularity, beauty and customer service segments.

Taiho’s Japanese university spinout-focused CVC arm’s capital injection came five months after its US sister unit got an additional $100m.

PanasonicWell appointed Christie Pitts to identify family-oriented investment, partnership and M&A opportunities.

Merck Group and Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology’s MoU will entail M Ventures helping grow South Korea’s ecosystem.

Luís Fábrica, formerly investment associate at the energy group’s CVC group, has been promoted after four years at the unit.

CVC veteran Takuya Hosomura, who spent a combined eight years at Rakuten Capital and Salesforce Ventures, joined Global Brain as a partner.

Corporate funding for startups is rising globally as well, with sectors such as as cybersecurity and healthcare seeing the most activity.

After three years at the Japanese electronics group’s CVC unit, Marc Bouchet got promoted for a second time to senior investment associate.