Grab Ventures Ignite names five winners in first cohort

Grab Ventures Ignite, a six-month scale-up program for early-stage startups in Vietnam, announced the five winners of its first batch.

Photo credit: Grab

Grab first launched Grab Ventures Ignite in Vietnam in support of its government’s strategy to create 10 technology unicorns by 2030. The program was implemented in partnership with the Vietnam National Innovation Center and in association with Singapore’s Infocomm Media Development Authority, Gobi Partners, co-working space provider Toong, Vietnam law firm Ykvn, Microsoft, and Amazon Web Services.

The winners in the latest batch are point-of-sale startup BePOS, communications programming platform Stringee, smart city mass-transit company GoDee, insurtech firm Papaya, and text-to-speech solution provider Vbee.

According to Grab Vietnam, it’s currently in discussions to form partnerships with the winning startups and aims to enable them to access and leverage Grab’s market access, technology capabilities, and expertise in Vietnam to expand their suite of products and services.

Officially launched in July this year, Grab Ventures Ignite has supported 13 participating startups.

Over the last three months, Grab said the companies in the Ignite program learned how to raise funds, market their products, and deepen their understanding of Vietnam’s macroeconomic landscape. They also got mentorship opportunities with Grab senior leaders and experts from its program partners.

“Many startups have challenges over scaling past the early stage due to difficulties in optimizing funds, scaling effectively in a high-growth and dynamic market, pivoting business models to cope with the rapidly changing landscape,” said Nguyen Thai Hai Van, managing director of Grab Vietnam.

In 2019, the Singapore-based ride-hailing giant announced that it would invest US$500 million into Vietnam over five years in fintech, new mobility solutions, and logistics.