Participated · Equity · Apr 2022

Aemi was founded by co‑founder and CEO Kim Vu with CTO Hieu Nguyen to address supply‑chain challenges faced by social commerce sellers in Vietnam. The company buys directly from brands on behalf of hundreds of social‑commerce sellers, using its aggregated purchasing power to negotiate lower wholesale prices and guarantee product provenance. It currently focuses on beauty and wellness and provides marketing support such as professional photos and product descriptions to help micro‑influencers sell. Aemi works with sellers who typically have about 10,000 to 30,000 followers and aims to expand into more verticals. The startup plans to build a suite of backend software—inventory, ordering, payment tools and drag‑and‑drop storefronts—to help sellers manage sales across social platforms. Aemi raised $2 million in funding to hire, especially product engineers, to build software for its micro‑merchants.

Participated · Seed · Feb 2022

Rino is building a quick-commerce grocery-delivery service that aims to cut delivery times to 10 minutes by owning inventory and operating dedicated dark stores. The company organizes cities into service zones with a 1–3 kilometer radius, placing a dedicated dark store in each zone and performing last-mile deliveries in batches with its own fleet of riders. Rino plans to launch this month in Ho Chi Minh City and expand first across the city’s most densely populated areas and then to Hanoi. Founder Trung Thanh Nguyen previously helped build Baemin Vietnam and led Grab Vietnam’s GrabBike and GrabExpress operations, bringing local logistics and growth experience. The company raised a $3 million pre-seed round to fund its launch and expansion. Rino’s strategy responds to slow grocery delivery times in Vietnam—currently sometimes two to three hours—by replicating the fast adoption curve seen in food delivery after times fell below 30 minutes. The team cites increased grocery adoption during COVID-19 lockdowns as supportive of sustained demand.

Participated · Seed · Aug 2021

Marathon Education provides online after-school math and science courses for grades 6–12 based on Vietnam’s Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) curriculum. The product pairs screened teachers with teaching assistants who manage groups of about 20–25 students, answer questions via instant messenger, and run breakout rooms for deeper lessons. Marathon handles administrative tasks for teachers (marketing, admissions, parent communications) so teachers can focus on course design; the company says teachers who switch from offline centers can potentially increase earnings two to three times. It launched first in Ho Chi Minh City and plans to expand across Vietnam, tailoring tutors’ regional accents and marketing to north/south cultural differences, and aims to eventually cover all MOET subjects. The startup is committed to an online-only model post-lockdown, citing a marked shift in parental receptiveness to online learning and 99% attendance rates during lockdowns. Marathon raised $1.5M in pre-seed funding to support its growth and scaling efforts.

Participated · Seed · Jun 2021

Founded in 2018, Infina is a Vietnamese asset-management and financial services platform. The company allows users to invest and manage assets via a mobile application, positioning itself within Vietnam’s fast-growing retail investing market. Infina reports a user base of roughly 1.3 million clients, with approximately 500,000 monthly active users demonstrating strong engagement. To accelerate growth, Infina has formed a strategic partnership with JB Securities Vietnam, the local subsidiary of Korea’s JB Financial Group. The collaboration is aimed at expanding Infina’s product suite and distribution channels within Vietnam’s burgeoning stock market. Through this alliance, both parties intend to leverage their complementary strengths—Infina’s digital platform and JB Securities’ brokerage and margin-loan capabilities—to capture additional market share.

Led · Seed · May 2021

Mio is a group-buying social commerce startup founded in 2020 that focuses on selling fresh produce and groceries in Tier 2 and 3 cities and rural areas of Vietnam. It routes produce directly from farms to customers via a vertically integrated supply chain — procurement, warehousing, order sorting and bulk delivery — and owns the majority of its logistics infrastructure and courier fleet. The company enables next-day delivery and says it can deliver fresh produce in less than 16 hours, which has driven higher customer retention. Mio sells through a reseller program called Mio Partners (often housewives and stay-at-home moms) who aggregate orders and earn commissions; the startup says partners can make up to $400 a month. Since TechCrunch last covered the company, Mio reported 10x gross merchandise value growth, a 10x increase in agents, grew its team from 60 to 240, and now fulfills more than 10,000 pieces of fresh produce per day across Ho Chi Minh, Thu Duc, Binh Duong, Dong Nai and Long An. The company plans to expand logistics and fulfillment, enter new Vietnamese provinces (including northern Vietnam) and add categories such as FMCG and household appliances, with potential international expansion considered later. Mio operates a social-commerce platform that recruits local resellers to market and manage group orders for fresh groceries in Vietnam’s smaller cities and rural areas. The company pairs that reseller network with an in-house logistics and fulfillment system, including a distribution center in Thu Duc, to enable next-day deliveries for orders placed before 8 p.m. Mio currently focuses on fresh produce and poultry and limits SKUs to lower logistics costs; it plans to expand into FMCG and household appliances, prioritizing higher-margin white-label goods. The startup claims hundreds of resellers (primarily women aged 25–35) and says resellers earn about $200–$300 on average, receiving a 10% commission plus additional referral-based commissions. Mio says its distribution center can process up to tens of thousands of daily order units. The company intends to use new funding to build out the distribution center and hire for its tech and product teams, and to add more personalization options so resellers can build their own brand identities.