42 portfolio companies that IDG Ventures has invested in Vietnam

IDG Ventures Vietnam was the first venture capital firm to invest in Vietnam over nine years ago, and has since been the leader in investing in Vietnam’s small and large technology companies. That means it’s also had the privilege of being in local the startup scene for some time.

IDG Ventures Vietnam started investing in Vietnam in 2004, back when the Vietnamese internet population was less than 10 million users. Today, the population is well over 30 million. Like most venture capital firms, its success rate is under 20 percent for startups invested, but companies like VNG, Vietnam’s biggest consumer tech company, have paid back the firm in droves.

So here, for your reading glory, are the 42 companies that IDGVV has invested in over its last nine years as an investment firm. Note that IDGVV may have been the first large VC firm to set up shop in Vietnam, but it’s not the only significant one – CyberAgent Ventures and DFJ VinaCapital make regular contributions to the Vietnamese tech and startup scene.

A large majority of these companies started between 2005 and 2007 just as the first wave of Vietnamese startups began to emerged. For IDGVV, the most noteworthy of these companies include: VNG, VC Corp, Vat Gia, Socbay, Peacesoft, Vinabook, Webtretho (Project Lana), and Vietnamworks. These have all either grown into massive companies, been acquired, or spun off into significantly larger projects.

Many in the industry have speculated that IDGVV has slowed down its investments in technology and has refocused investments in other areas. But associates in IDGVV also say that their offices are focusing more on growing the startups it have already invested in.

Please note that in the list below, not all are tech investments but some have been drawn into the tech fold. For example, FBNC Vietnam is slowly transitioning away from traditional video media to more digital. Also, companies like Classbook have received IDGVV investments but have never stated publicly the investment round nor does IDGVV publish the site its public list.

All data for this post was garnered here, at IDGVV’s portfolio list. Click there for more details.

1. Apollo Vietnam – An English languge training company that specializes in using English learning software licensed from the USA.
2. Cyvee – Once a potential competitor to About.me or LinkedIn, Cyvee is a social networking site for professionals. Cyvee also manages Vietladders, an online career community for managers. So far Cyvee hasn’t seen much traction nor noise as of late.
3. Dia Diem – One of Vietnam’s first online location based sites, the company was founded by Nhom Mua’s founder, Tom Tran, who is now running Kay.vn. Nhom Mua up until late last year was one of Vietnam’s rising daily deal stars. It floundered in a sea of embezzlement and management issues, which left the company under a new set of management who have failed to take it to the next level. Dia Diem, on the other hand, is still being managed by Tran and made some of its money off of ads and selling location data to Google Maps.
4. Dia Oc – Dia Oc is among the many online platforms for real estate in Vietnam. It is one of the leaders in the category, but with fierce competition from Batdongsan and Muabannhadat, it’s unclear if the site will become a clear market leader anytime soon.
5. DMS Group – If there’s two areas in the online space in Vietnam, it’s startups and digital agencies. DMS is one company which operates in the online advertising space. The cool thing about DMS is that it’s got customers across the region as opposed to just Vietnam.
6. DreamViet – DreamViet manages a property called Aha.vn. It’s an e-commerce comparison site, similar to Oi Zoi Oi. Considering that e-commerce sites are already struggling to gain traction and advertise, it’s a bit early for e-commerce comparison traction.

1. ePi – ePi is an online media company whose main product is BaoMoi, which was quietly acquired by VNG last year. BaoMoi is a news aggregator that grabs news from across Vietnam’s online news media. This, of course, upset local news organizations, which sued BaoMoi in March.
2. FBNC – TV is still one of the biggest media channels in Vietnam, with over 80 percent of advertising going to television. This puts FBNC, which is itself a TV channel, in a very interesting space. It’s got one foot in the television world, while it’s also working hard on getting stronger in the online video and events space. With its close connections in the startup world, FBNC has also started featuring more startups on its online shows.
3. GES – GES is mainly in the hardware business, specializing in semiconductors, solar, flat panel, and medical markets.
4. Goldsun Focus Media – You see all those televisions with advertisements in elevators, taxis, and public areas? That’s Goldsun Focus Media.
5. Hocmai.vn – Hocmai, meaning “learn forever”, is tan education portal which has over 400,000 subscribers. It specializes in providing useful educational content for exams, studying and even e-books.
6. Isphere Soft – Isphere Soft is in outsourcing but is most notable for running Cyworld, a Vietnamese version of the popular Korean social networking platform. So far, Cyworld is still far from gaining traction up against the likes of Zing Me (from VNG) and Facebook.
7. Magnet – Magnet is an e-commerce platform that operates out of the States.
8. Minh Dat Viet – This company manages a web property called Thodia, which focuses on location reviews for shopping, dining, and entertainment. It’s up against Foody in the restaurant category, which is funded by CyberAgent Ventures.
9. Mobivox – This is another company based in the USA, but it does VoIP services and applications.
10. Moore Corp – Moore basically does online content and advertising in Vietnam. It manages three main properties including: VietAd, Anhso.net, and Nghenhac.info. The two latter ones are in photo storage and music streaming. Nghenhac.info, being in music, is up against Nhac Cua Tui, which is a CyberAgent funded company and Zing MP3, which is from VNG.
11. MSS – MSS focuses on four main areas: mobile content, mobile technology, digital marketing, and SMS. That also means its up against big winners like Pops Worldwide and Appota. So far MSS hasn’t made any big moves, indicating slow growth.
12. Muaban – Classifieds are a huge market and Muaban is one of the five main competitors in this category. 5giay is one of the key market leaders in classifieds but has been content to sit and not scale beyond a certain point. This may also be because the market has a threshold.
13. MX – Vietnam has a crowded but slow moving payment market with over 18 players and MX is in the category of prepaid, PIN-based payment solutions. This is an area where Rev Vietnam totally failed in, so it’s unclear if MX has gained traction with a similar business model.