Monolith Management has closed its second China-focused US dollar-denominated venture capital fund at the hard cap of USD 289m, according to three sources familiar with the situation.

The fund – Monolith Venture Fund II – is slightly larger than its predecessor, which closed on USD 264m in June 2023 with commitments from US endowments, Asian family offices, and fund-of-funds. Most existing LPs re-upped, while new investors include an Asian sovereign wealth fund, the sources added.

Monolith announced on 11 November that it had raised USD 488m across two vehicles – a second US dollar fund and its debut renminbi fund – without giving the size of each one. It stated that aggregate subscriptions amounted to approximately 160% of the initial targeted capacity.

The fundraising took place in challenging conditions. Barely a handful of China VC managers have secured commitments for US dollar funds amounting to just over USD 1.2bn in 2025 to date, according to AVCJ Research. This compares to a trailing six-year average of USD 8.7bn. Many firms are looking to diversify historically US-centric LP bases.

Monolith’s fundraise took three months. The data room opened around July, and the fund was swiftly oversubscribed by September, the sources said. Allocations were cut back on a pro rata basis to maintain fund size discipline following discussions with LPs, the previous sources and a fourth source said.

The firm’s original target was USD 265m, Bloomberg reported in July. A US regulatory filing made last month gave the target as USD 289m.

On the renminbi side, Monolith made filings for five venture capital vehicles with the Asset Management Association of China (AMAC) between April 2023 and February 2025. According to domestic business registration information provider Qichacha.com, the combined size of these vehicles is CNY 14bn (USD 199m).

Regulatory records disclose the identities of several LPs. They include Oriza FoFs, Peiyang Begonia Fund, HSG, Ant Group, entities backed by the Shanghai municipal government, and a subsidiary of Shanghai-listed Tianjin Youfa Steel Pipe Group.

Monolith was established in 2021 by Xi Cao and Timothy Wang, who were previously partners at HSG and Boyu Capital, respectively. The first product launched was a technology-focused hedge fund, which closed on USD 500m. A successor fund of undisclosed size closed in mid-2025. Assets under management across all strategies now exceed CNY 10bn.

The firm’s venture capital funds – US dollar and renminbi – focus on early-stage investments in artificial intelligence (AI). Areas of interest span applications, model infrastructure, hardware, and embodied intelligence, according to the previous announcement.

Existing portfolio companies include large language model (LLM) developer Moonshot AI, AI-enabled education platform Aitutor100, and robot specialists Beatbot and Joyln. Monolith also backed AI chip designer MetaX Tech, via the renminbi fund, which received approval last month to list on Shanghai’s Star Market.

Monolith declined to comment.