Zhubajie charges on toward unicorn status, and flotation

One of China’s largest online crowdsourcing platforms, created a decade ago by a veteran journalist and backed by its local government, is seeking another round of funding a year after its last, with the aim of becoming a “unicorn” company and floating next year.

Zhubajie.com, which claims more than 16 million users, announced just 12 months ago it had secured 1.6 billion yuan in C-round financing from Cybernaut (China) Investment, a Beijing-based venture capital firm that focuses on technology, and another 1 billion yuan in backing from the government of the Liangjiang New Zone in Chongqing, where the company is based.

Now valued at 11 billion yuan, Zhubajie is looking for another round this year with plans to go public on the mainland by 2017, according to the zone’s Bureau of Science and Technology Innovation.

Yang Chunlin, the director of the bureau, said its efforts to help Zhubajie become a unicorn company – defined as a start-up valued more than US$1 billion – were aimed at building a successful model to attract high-growth tech companies across the country to locate in the city to boost the region’s tech industry and economy.

With the new investment of 2.6 billion yuan, the company hopes to transform from a so-called “witkey website” into a “super incubator” to stimulate entrepreneurship and encourage business start-ups in 35 mainland cities this year, expanding to 100 cities in over 10 years.