Until recently, investment rounds of $1bn or more in private tech companies were almost unheard of. But other Asian start-ups to reach that mark in the second quarter alone included PayTM, an Indian payments company, Go-Jek, Indonesia’s answer to Uber, Chinese food delivery service Ele.me, and the maker of Toutiao, a Chinese news aggregation app. Leaving aside the distortions caused by quarterly peaks and troughs, the American venture capital industry still comfortably exceeds that of Asia. At nearly $63bn last year, venture investment in the US was more than double the amount invested in Asia. But the second-quarter swing across the Pacific underlines a big shift compared to previous tech booms, when Silicon Valley sucked up many of the world’s brightest entrepreneurs and most promising companies.

https://www.ft.com/content/f97ed1aa-669d-11e7-9a66-93fb352ba1fe