The "villagers" in Shenzhen have become limited partners again.

Recently, two venture capital funds funded by a Shenzhen village collective - Shenzhen Bantian Artificial Intelligence Venture Capital Fund and Shenzhen Longgang Longxing Venture Capital Fund - signed investment intention agreements. The total scale of the two funds is 300 million yuan, with a duration of 10 years, and Nanling Venture Capital serves as the fund manager.

This time, the limited partners (LPs) behind the funds - the Shenzhen village collective companies - have once again piqued the curiosity of the venture capital circle.

With a total scale of 300 million yuan and a duration of 10 years, a Shenzhen village has made an investment

Let's first take a look at the two funds -

Longgang Longxing Venture Capital Fund has a total scale of 200 million yuan and a duration of 10 years. In terms of the investors, Longgang Financial Holdings contributes 30%, Longxing Venture Capital 50%, Nanling Village 10%, Zhangshubu Village 5%, and Shanglilang Village 5%.

Among them, Longxing Venture Capital was jointly initiated and established in 2018 (based on the subscription date) by five village - owned enterprises from Nanlian Village, Nanyue Village, Longgang Village, Tongle Village, and Longdong Village in Longgang District. Tianyancha shows that in 2023, Longxing Venture Capital invested in establishing a fund - Hongtu Longcheng Innovation (Shenzhen) Private Equity Investment Fund Partnership (Limited Partnership), with a shareholding ratio of approximately 24.7%. The manager of this fund is Shenzhen Capital Group.

Bantian Artificial Intelligence Venture Capital Fund has a total scale of 100 million yuan and also has a duration of 10 years. The investors behind it include four village - owned enterprises: Bantian Group, Gangtou Village, Hepinggang Village, and Fengmen'ao Village.

Among them, Bantian Group contributes 50%. The actual controller behind it is Bantian Village Committee (collective shares) in Buji Town, Longgang District, Shenzhen. Over the years, Bantian Group has invested in many local enterprises and currently controls more than 20 companies.

It is worth mentioning that the manager of both funds is Nanling Venture Capital, a village - collective venture capital institution in Shenzhen. As early as 2017, Nanling Venture Capital was established in Shenzhen, backed by Nanling Village. It conducts equity investment in the mode of "direct investment + mother fund" and has become the first venture capital institution established by a village collective economy in China.

Nowadays, the investment fields of Nanling Venture Capital have covered cutting - edge areas such as biomedicine, advanced manufacturing, artificial intelligence, and electronic information. In April 2022, with the listing of Haichuang Pharmaceutical on the STAR Market of the Shanghai Stock Exchange, Nanling Village Community achieved its first IPO. Among the more than 10 invested projects, most projects have received a new round of financing, and several projects have met or are close to the IPO conditions.

This time, both funds were planned and actively promoted by the state - owned asset system in Longgang District. Currently, they have completed fundraising. After fulfilling the legal procedures, they will invest in fields such as artificial intelligence, robotics, semiconductors, high - end manufacturing, and biomedicine. It is reported that a number of projects have been reserved.

This is the latest move of Shenzhen's village collectives into the venture capital field. According to incomplete statistics, as of now, nearly 40 village share - holding cooperative companies in Shenzhen have participated in equity investment, including those in Nanshan, Luohu, Longgang, Longhua, and Pingshan districts.

A group of hidden LPs in Shenzhen

Here is some background information: In the past few decades, first - tier cities led by Shenzhen have rapidly accumulated a large amount of funds through land resources. Indigenous villagers' net worth skyrocketed overnight. The village collectives where they are located often establish a share - holding cooperative company locally. All rural collective economies in Shenzhen operate in the name of community share - holding cooperative companies.

For many years, the funds of village collectives have usually generated income through property leasing, bank deposits, and financial management. However, with the passage of time, the funds in the hands of villagers have depreciated to a certain extent. At this time, a number of emerging industries have emerged in Shenzhen. Turning to venture capital and joining the upsurge of the rise of these industries, the funds of village collectives have begun to be seen.

In 2022, five community share - holding cooperative companies in Maluanshan, Shatang, and Liulian in Pingshan District, Shenzhen joined hands as LPs and invested in a special fund initiated by the district's industrial capital investment company. This fund has invested in Honor and taken shares in Pearl River Village Bank.

One year later, Luohu District organized 11 community share - holding cooperative companies such as Caiwuwei, Huangbeiling Jingxuan, and Hubei to revitalize more than 100 million yuan of collective funds. They cooperated with Shenzhen High - tech Investment Group Co., Ltd., a state - owned enterprise under the city, and established the first equity investment fund jointly built with state - owned assets, with a total scale of 170 million yuan.

The most attention - grabbing event was in July 2023 - a new 505 million - yuan fund of Shenzhen Capital Group was launched, which gathered 16 share - holding cooperative companies at once, with a total investment of 405 million yuan.

This was the fund with the largest investment scale and proportion from share - holding cooperative companies among Shenzhen's private equity investment funds at that time. The investment fields of the fund mainly cover the "20 + 8" industrial fields in Shenzhen, such as information technology, high - end equipment manufacturing, new materials, biology (medicine), and new energy.

So far, the mysterious funds of village collectives have gradually come to the surface. Generally speaking, the funds of village collectives have two characteristics:

On the one hand, most of the villagers' funds are idle for a long time. For institutions in the current hard - tech and biomedicine sectors, they are long - term funds, and there is less pressure on the exit time. On the other hand, there are not many restrictions on the funds. Compared with government - guided funds with obvious investment promotion requirements, villagers will not overly interfere with the investments of general partners (GPs).

Of course, when village collectives enter the venture capital circle, the capital volume and risk tolerance are also pain points that need to be considered.

On March 11, 2025, the "Action Plan for Promoting the High - quality Development of Venture Capital in Shenzhen (2025 - 2026)" was released, which mentioned - further guiding the surplus funds of share - holding cooperative companies in our city to enter the venture capital field in an orderly manner.

The villagers who have enjoyed the dividends of the times have begun to support the local industries. From the past "farming" and "building houses" to "cultivating high - tech enterprises", the villagers may not understand the projects, so they entrust the funds to professional investment institutions and truly participate in the local development.

The "landlords" and "landladies" shuttling through the narrow alleys of civilian houses are also going to chase the stars and the sea together with the investors sipping coffee in office buildings.

This article is from the WeChat official account "Investment World". The author is Yang Wenjing. It is published by 36Kr with permission.