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SEA Daily Brief: Singapore's GIC and Temasek co-anchor Anthropic's $65B raise, a Singapore developer lands $283M of green debt for a Johor AI data centre, and KBank teams with Ant International on Thailand's cross-border rails

GIC co-led and Temasek joined Anthropic's US$65 billion Series H at a US$965 billion post-money valuation, putting Singapore's sovereign funds at the centre of frontier-AI financing. Singapore-based developer DDSP closed US$283 million in green financing — arranged by CTBC Bank, MUFG and Standard Chartered — for a 45MW liquid-cooled AI data centre in Johor's Sedenak Tech Park. And in Thailand, KBank signed an MOU with Ant International to build 24/7 cross-border USD payment and liquidity rails on J.P. Morgan's Kinexys blockchain.

June 2, 20264 min readSingapore · Malaysia · Thailand · AI · Data Centers · Cross-Border Payments · Venture Capital · Sovereign Wealth
Editorial photograph of a high-density data centre corridor: rows of dark server racks with exposed copper liquid-cooling manifolds running overhead, cool blue LED status lights reflecting off the polished floor, no people in frame.
Singapore capital is anchoring the region's AI build-out — from Anthropic's US$65 billion Series H to a US$283 million green-financed data centre across the causeway in Johor.

GIC Co-Leads and Temasek Joins Anthropic's US$65 Billion Series H at a US$965 Billion Valuation

Anthropic closed a US$65 billion Series H on May 29, valuing the company at US$965 billion post-money — among the largest private financings on record. Singapore's two state investors were prominent: GIC participated as a co-lead investor, alongside Capital Group, Coatue, D1 Capital Partners, ICONIQ and XN, while Temasek joined as a significant investor. The raise also folds in roughly US$15 billion of previously committed hyperscaler investment, including US$5 billion from Amazon, and lands as Anthropic's run-rate revenue crossed US$47 billion. The company says the proceeds will fund safety and interpretability research, expanded compute and the scaling of its products and partnerships.

The placement extends a pattern Layer 7 has tracked all week: Singapore is recycling sovereign capital into the frontier-AI build-out at the top of the stack. GIC and Temasek have backed earlier Anthropic and OpenAI rounds, and the city-state's funds now sit among a small group of institutions writing cheques large enough to anchor nine- and ten-figure AI rounds.

Sources

Singapore-Based DDSP Closes US$283 Million Green Financing for a 45MW AI Data Centre in Johor

DDSP, a Singapore-based infrastructure developer, has secured US$283 million in green financing for a 45MW built-to-suit hyperscale data centre campus in Johor's Sedenak Tech Park, the company said on May 29. The facility is designed with liquid cooling for AI workloads. CTBC Bank, MUFG, Standard Chartered and Entie Commercial Bank acted as mandated lead arrangers, with additional regional and international lenders joining through syndication. DDSP frames the campus as one node in a broader 1.1 GW development pipeline spanning five Asia-Pacific countries.

Structured as a green loan, the deal channels institutional debt — not just sponsor equity — into Johor's accelerating data-centre cluster, the build-out across the causeway from Singapore that has drawn hyperscalers seeking power and land the city-state cannot easily supply.

Sources

KBank and Ant International Sign MOU to Build 24/7 Cross-Border Payment and Liquidity Rails in Thailand

Thailand's Kasikornbank (KBank) and Ant International signed a memorandum of understanding on June 1 to develop integrated financial infrastructure for cross-border payments and liquidity management, combining KBank's regulated banking with Ant's AI-driven payment technology. The architecture leans on Blockchain Deposit Accounts from Kinexys, J.P. Morgan's blockchain division, to move USD liquidity in real time on a 24/7 basis, and spans payment acceptance, clearing and settlement. KBank's KPLUS app already connects to Alipay+, which Ant says reaches 150 million merchants and 2 billion consumer accounts worldwide, and integrates with Ant's Antom merchant service.

KBank executive Karin Boonlertvanich framed the tie-up as integrating blockchain with regulated financial systems to enable a more continuous and scalable flow of funds between global networks and local economies, with Thai small businesses and merchants the intended beneficiaries.

Sources

Eyes on the Day Ahead

Nothing major is formally docketed in the next 24 hours, so look to the next few days. Watch for follow-through on Anthropic's compute agreements — and any signal of whether other Asian sovereign or pension funds join GIC and Temasek in AI primaries at these valuations. In Malaysia, track whether DDSP's Johor financing prompts further green-labelled debt into Sedenak and the wider data-centre cluster, where power availability remains the binding constraint. And on the KBank–Ant tie-up, the detail to watch is the move from MOU to a live, regulator-cleared tokenised-deposit settlement pilot.

Layer 7 Ventures is a research-driven firm focused on AI and cryptocurrency in Southeast Asia. Views expressed are those of the firm and do not constitute investment advice.

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