Vietnam’s taembe.com closes US$228K seed round

• First Vietnamese startup to graduate from JFDI.Asia’s accelerator programme
• Started by selling baby products directly to customers, has since expanded business

VIETNAM’S taembe.com, an online baby retailer and marketplace for third-party sellers and second-hand goods for mothers, said that it had closed a US$228,000 seed funding round led by Swiss Founders Fund.
 
The round is supported by Binh Tran, former chief technology officer and cofounder of Klout; Eddie Thai, a local startup advisor; as well as an international syndicate of angel investors, it said in a statement.
 
“Swiss Founders Fund was the ideal choice for us because its partners know how to build sustainable businesses in South-East Asia,” said taembe.com chief executive officer Don Phan.
 
Phan (pic) was previously the cofounder and managing director of Zalora Vietnam and foodpanda Vietnam, both Rocket Internet ventures.
 
He founded taembe.com after shopping for groceries with his wife. They noticed a young mother struggling to drive a motorbike while holding her baby and large packs of diapers. The idea for a diaper delivery service was born.
 
‘tã em bé’ is the Vietnamese word for ‘diaper.’
 
taembe.com started by selling diapers and other baby products directly to customers, and has since expanded the service to include other bulky home consumables such as detergents.
 
The business is fast approaching profitability and has been growing revenues 20% month-over-month this year, the company claimed.
 
In 2015, taembe.com became the first Vietnamese startup to graduate from JFDI.Asia’s accelerator programme, following an investor demo day in July this year.
 
Vietnam has a population that is pushing 100 million people, with 1.5 million babies born every year, and 64% of the population under the age of 35, the company said in its statement.
 
About 12% of households in Vietnam have children below the age of one. According to a recent Nielson report, more than one in 10 consumers in Vietnam report having a baby below the age of one in their household, the highest levels in the region and double the global average of 5%.
 
A further 19% of consumers in Vietnam have children aged one to two years old in their household, compared to just 9% globally.
 
“We’ve been following developments in Vietnam closely and we believe the baby market is a winner-take-most market,” said Swiss Founders Fund partner Patrick Degen.
 
“taembe.com has the most traction and is the most likely to win the market,” he added.
 
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