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Tanya Mariano · · 11 min readMental health startups reach tipping point in SEA
In the five years after she gave birth to her first child, Nur Sara Abu Bakar struggled to shed her pregnancy weight. When she heard that Azran Osman-Rani, the former CEO at AirAsia X, had launched a wellness-focused company called Naluri, she gave the app a try. After less than 10 months with the program, she lost 10 to 15 kilograms.
Abu Bakar credits the program for her weight loss success: “Little did I know that losing weight isn’t just about controlling your diet. It’s very important that you are mentally healthy as well.”
Azran Osman-Rani (left) and Naluri team members / Photo credit: Naluri
Founded in 2017, Malaysia-based Naluri gives clients access to coaches covering a wide spectrum of expertise: psychologists, dieticians, career coaches, financial planners, and even women’s health specialists. The idea is that users are likely to get lasting results if they look at wellness from all angles.
As the psychological toll of the Covid-19 pandemic puts a spotlight on mental health, opportunities have opened up for Naluri and other similar startups. But rather than competing in the saturated B2C space, these companies are diving into the blue ocean that is the B2B market.
About a year after Abu Bakar signed up as an individual user, she joined SP Setia Berhad—a Malaysian property development company that would eventually become one of Naluri’s corporate clients.
Betting on peace of mind
Several studies—including the Mental State of the World 2020 by Sapien Labs and a review published in the journal Scientific Reports—point to an uptick in mental health problems around the world in 2020.
“Based on my own anecdotal experience, there’s definitely a lot more people stepping forward to seek help for mental (health) difficulties. We’ve also received quite a number of calls and inquiries for services,” says Pearlene Ng, a senior clinical psychologist and head of the Psychological Services Institute at Viriya Community Services in Singapore.
Ng says that people have only recently come to see mental health issues the same way as physical ones and understand that they’re something anyone can have. People are starting to realize that going to therapy is no different from consulting a physician.
It’s not just mental health professionals who’ve observed this – investors are paying attention, too.
According to CB Insights, funding for mental health startups hit a record high of US$576 million in the first quarter of 2020, 400% higher than the last quarter of 2019. This continued into the second quarter of 2021, with funding going up 54% from the first quarter of the year, driven mainly by deals in late-stage mental health startups and employee wellness benefits platforms.
MindFi and Intellect secured funding in 2021 / Image credit: MindFi and Intellect
Two mental health startups from Singapore secured funding in 2021. MindFi, founded in 2017, raised US$750,000 and made it into Y Combinator’s summer 2021 program.
A long-brewing crisis
Making mental healthcare affordable
Rapid growth in 2020
Why targeting employers makes sense
Do the apps really work?
The road ahead
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Asia’s mental healthcare system is broken, and these startups want to fix it. But instead of targeting consumers, they’re taking it straight to businesses.
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