One lasting impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is a surge in China's online education market, with virtual tutoring growing the fastest.

Chinese venture investment in edtech reached $3.5 billion through the first half of 2019, nearly twice the level in the U.S.  

One of the main contenders is VIPKid , which has raised mega-financing of more than $1.1 billion from leading venture capital firms that include Sinovation Ventures and Sequoia Capital China , as well as Chinese tech giant Tencent .

Chinese fitness app Keep becomes the first sports unicorn, completing an $80 million E round of financing led by J eneration Capital , with prior investors GGV Capital , Tencent , Morningside Venture Capital and BAI Capital .

Deals: India

Digital credit ledger  Khatabook  has raised $60 million in a new equity financing round led by  B Capital  Group , the investment firm founded by  Facebook  co-founder Eduardo Saverin .

This takes the total funding raised by the two-year old firm to $87 million. Existing investors from Sequoia Capital, DST Global, Tencent, GGV Capital and RTP Global joined the round.

IPOs

Chinese technology companies NetEase and JD.com have set dates for secondary listings in Hong Kong, according to Reuters. The two transactions could raised a combined $5 billion.

Meanwhile, as U.S.-China tensions increase and a once-active cross-border tech bridge lengthens, Chinese tech titan Baidu is mulling a secondary listing in Hong Kong.

All three Chinese tech companies are listed on Nasdaq.

India's Iron Pillar Brings In $45M

Adding fuel to India's burgeoning startup ecosystem that now has 38 tech unicorns, Indian fund Iron Pillar closed on $45 million to top off its earlier fund of $90 million raised in 2018. The capital will go toward shoring up its most promising portfolio companies, 8 of which were invested in from the venture growth investor firm's first fund.

 Founded in 2016 with bases in Palo Alto and Bangalore, Iron Pillar added three global institutions, including global alternatives investor 57 Stars and one large European family office to its investor base.

A top Disney executive, Kevin Mayer, has been hired to run the highly popular app TikTok, made by Chinese titan ByteDance, in the U.S. -- a move seen to further distance itself from its original parent and quell critics who contend the app is censored.

The surprise move led U.S. Senator Josh Howley to tweet, " TikTok US previously told me they couldn’t attend hearings and testify because executives were located in China . But this new executive lives in the USA. I look forward to hearing from him. Under oath ."

Prompted by the Luckin Coffee accounting scandal, Nasdaq  is planning  new rules  to make initial public offerings more difficult for some   Chinese  companies. The tightening will require companies to raise at least $25 million in equity capital in an IPO or a sum equivalent to a quarter of the value of the group once listed. They must also have managers familiar with US transparency and accounting standards.

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