TOKYO -- Nikkei on Monday said it acquired a 14.79% stake in Singapore-based artificial intelligence startup DC Frontiers for an undisclosed sum.
The Japanese media group aims to enhance its corporate data and news service scoutAsia in cooperation with DCF. The deal follows Nikkei's investment in Singaporean news site DealStreetAsia and partnership with Chinese tech news portal 36Kr, highlighting its focus on strengthening Asiawide coverage.
Nikkei and the Financial Times launched scoutAsia last year, creating an extensive database of Asian companies and regional business news. Nikkei acquired the FT back in 2015.
Founded in 2011, DCF specializes in the use of AI for tasks like article tagging and creating maps that illustrate relationships between companies, individuals and investments. It has provided services to financial and nonfinancial corporations and Asian government institutions under the brand name Handshakes, and is licensed to sell the corporate data of more than 90 million companies in China, Singapore, Malaysia and Vietnam.
DCF's AI and machine-learning technologies are aimed at improving the accuracy and efficiency of searches for news and corporate data. The new co-developed features will become available from October.
Projects like scoutAsia and Excedo, a business English education program, are part of the Nikkei Group's strategic diversification, the company said in a news release.
(Nikkei)
