Existing investors, Google Ventures, Project A Ventures, Greycroft, The Chernin Group, and Allen & Co, also participated.
Based on a pilot study and the current Chinese regulations, the paper identifies the possible types of collaboration for foreign contractors in China, namely mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, project-based collaboration, and strategic alliances.
Affiliates of Exxon Mobil Corp and Saudi Basic Industries Corp (SABIC) are to undertake a detailed study of the proposed Gulf Coast Growth Ventures project in Texas and begin planning for front-end engineering and design work.
Nest, for instance, was one of many companies that Google has backed via its Google Ventures project, an initiative launched in 2009 with the intent of providing "seed, venture, and growth-stage funding to the best companies".
The pilot study reveals that foreign contractors tend to collaborate with their Chinese partners in the form of strategic alliances but that Chinese design institutes and construction enterprises would be willing to collaborate with foreign contractors on the basis of international joint ventures, project-based collaboration, or strategic alliances.
The company has also raised a $2.3 million round of funding from an impressive list of investors: Polaris Ventures, Greylock Partners, Lerer Ventures, SV Angel, Atlas Ventures, Broad Beach Ventures, Project 11, Ray Ozzie and Raman Narayanan.
Last month Spindle, which boosts a team filled with ex-Microsoft engineers, announced that it had raised a $2.3 million round of funding from investors including Polaris Ventures, Greylock Partners, Lerer Ventures, SV Angel, Atlas Ventures, Broad Beach Ventures, Project 11, Ray Ozzie and Raman Narayanan.
"The money will be used to finance their upstream joint venture projects," the statement said.
Last year, South Korean companies sent 203 technicians north to work on joint-venture projects, more than double the previous year's level.
Nigeria signed a $3.1 billion deal with the local arm of Royal Dutch Shell on Monday to plug a funding gap in their joint venture projects, the country's state oil firm NNPC said.
Lastly, this paper extensively documented the successful technological learning in South Korea's T-50 and Brazil's AMX joint venture projects.
