Tribe, a blockchain accelerator backed by the government of Singapore, has received a strategic investment from Korea Investment Partners (KIP) and Mandiri Investment Management.

Greg Kidd, an early investor in Twitter, Coinbase and Square, besides Hong Kong-based Stellar Partners, also co-invested.

This marks KIP’s first direct investment into Singapore.

Tribe will use the funds to grow its accelerator and academy programmes into newer markets, including the US, Korea, Indonesia and Hong Kong.

Additionally, Tribe has also announced a partnership with American drug giant Pfizer to provide startups with support like technical expertise, resources and access to networks. Its other notable partners include HSBC, Infineon Technologies, Citibank and Ubisoft.

Founded in 2018, Tribe works closely with global corporations, government agencies, blockchain companies and late-stage startups to build a community that promotes blockchain collaborations and innovations.

Its goal is “to generate greater public awareness of the benefits and relevance in the everyday use of distributed ledger technology through the usage of decentralised applications (dApps) or backend digital solutions”.

Also Read: In brief: Singapore’s blockchain accelerator Tribe goes virtual for batch 3

“We are supporting a range of cutting-edge blockchain startups from around the world, with a total valuation of over US$1 billion, that are solving global problems from food security, education efforts to medicine deliveries,” said Tribe CEO, Yi Ming Ng.

“The pandemic has placed a spotlight on the pharmaceutical and healthcare industry, and in the process speeded up its digital transformation,” added Bei Goh, Digital Client Partner Lead Emerging Markets Asia, Pfizer, added.

“There is huge potential for blockchain in the pharmaceutical sector, from the tracking and authenticating of vaccines and medicines to making supply chains more efficient. Being a part of the Tribe ecosystem gives us access to promising blockchain and other deep tech startups as well as insights into the latest trends across the industry,” he shared.

Tribe also said that its participating startups have raised US$70 million since joining the programme. Some of its acceleratees are Accredify, AID:Tech, TADA and xfers.

Read the original article here.