While most of the Asian private equity world is getting lukewarm responses to their latest fund offerings, Walden International's Lip-bu Tan has proudly announced his entry into the billion dollar club with the final closing of PacVen V.

Investors in PacVen V include long-time supporters HarbourVest Partners, Pantheon Ventures, Granville Private Equity, Harvard University, Stanford University, MIT, IBM, AT&T, Verizon, Ford Foundation and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

Pacven V has also been successful in attracting key strategic corporate and financial investors including Adaptec, AOL Time Warner Ventures, CSFB, DBS Bank, Goldman Sachs, GIC Special Investments Pte Ltd., Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, Robertson Stephens' BAYVIEW 2000, L.P., Sumitomo and Temasek Holdings.

There is really only one key prerequisite to raising that kind of money, and that's returns. The announcement follows one of Walden's most successful years. In 2000, Walden had more than 20 portfolio companies completing IPOs or acquisitions. The list includes Centillium, iAsiaWorks, Accelerated Networks, EndWave, MediaRing, Promatory, SINA.com, Sonoma Systems, WebEx, Tsqware and Transmeta.

Other closes

Not everyone boasts the high-profile exits that Walden has recorded. Shaw, Kwei & Partners' Asia Value Investment Fund decided on investing the $26 million already raised, rather than continuing to chase funds in a difficult market.

Despite the fact that its principals have built a very respectable track record in asia, the relatively small size of their organization meant that there was little support from large institutions. A major portion of the capital raised comes from executives of the companies the fund's principals helped finance in earlier parts of their careers.

In JAFCO Asia's case, backing from a rich and powerful parent company certainly helped. Its latest fund, JAFCO Asia Technology Fund, recently closed on $178 million. Besides support from its Tokyo listed parent company, JAFCO, investors in the fund include such Japan-based institutions as Daiwa Bank, Hitachi ITX Corp, Itochu, Kanematsu Electronics and Nomura Research.

The fund will underwrite the investment activities of the new and revitalized JAFCO Asia, which is jointly led by a local investment team made up of Executive VPs Vincent Chan (North Asia) and Bradley Chew (South Asia).

Also making good use of its pedigree is the HSBC Technology Fund managed by HSBC Private Equity. The fund, which targets investments in Internet-related businesses in Asia, was able to raise $54.5 million partly due to the strength of the HSBC name.

Finally, TMT Ventures, a joint venture between DirectCapital Private Equity and Advent International, has reported a first closing on A$70 million. The fund, which will target IT opportunities down under, has received commitments from such names as Telecom New Zealand, Lucent Technologies, Marconi, AXA and Rotorua Energy Trust.

New funds

Despite the gloomy overall situation, several new funds still found their way into the market. Leading the way is the taipan, Simon Murray, with his second regional fund, GEMS O&G II. The $500 million fund will continue GEMS' strategy of investing in companies sourced through Murray's rolodex of Asian players.

AsiaDirectCapital's Ray Hood is back with another Thailand-focused fund called the Thai Recovery Fund. The fund targets $100 million but already has from a list of multilaterals including Asian Development Bank, Japan Bank for International Cooperation, Germany's Kreditanstalt fur Wiederaufbau and State Street Corporation, AsiaDirect's parent.

A couple of funds from down under with the most notable being the duo of funds launched by Kiwi investment bank i-cap partners. The Auckland-based firm is targeting two different markets with its pair of NZ$50 million funds. The first, i-cap Equity Partners, will target venture capital investments, while i-cap Mezzanine Equity Partners will provide short-term mezzanine financing to unlisted corporations.