Vietnamese food platform raises $500,000 in second seed round investment.
Vietnamese homegrown venture capital firm ESP Capital recently announced it has completed a second seed round investment in Vietnamese food recipe portal Cooky, raising $500,000 in a funding round led by an existing backer.
Local venture firm Founders Capital and undisclosed angel investors also participated in the financing round. The food portal previously received seed financing from ESP Capital in 2017.
“After working for a long time with the Cooky team, we decided to accompany it for the long term and supplemented capital in order to support its growth in the time to come,” said Ms. Le Hoang Uyen Vy, CEO of ESP Capital. “I recognize that home cooking demand has become more popular among the millennial generation, especially young married couples. The Cooky platform has grown rapidly, as have our expectations, so we fully believe in its development potential in the future.”
“The latest investment will be used to enhance our offerings, enlarge the user base and expand our operations,” said Mr. Vuong Nguyen, founder of Cooky. “Cooky hopes to be the bridge for people’s cooking becoming easier and more interesting.”
Founded in 2015, the food recipe portal now has over 3 million visits per month as well as 40,000 recipes on its online platform and more than 200 offline cooking tutorial sessions. Cooky said it was targeting millennials, who were born between 1980 and 2000 and account for 33 per cent of Vietnam’s population of 100 million and are more inclined towards the do-it-yourself and online sharing lifestyles.
Cooky further said that it plans to deepen its brand name through a series of initiatives, including organizing more tutorial sessions, connecting users with celebrities and chefs, and increasing online interaction between users.
ESP Capital, established in 2017, has $20 million in the kitty to invest in early-stage Vietnamese startups. It is also targeting opportunities across Southeast Asia. It has funded ten companies, including eight Vietnamese startups and two Singapore-based startups. Founders Capital is domiciled in Singapore and has an office in Hanoi. It has backed Vietnamese startups including Netlink, Zmedia, Thethao247, Metub Network, Luxstay and Viralworks.
Two months ago, the Vietnam-based provider of video and livestream cloud API platform Uiza also secured an undisclosed pre-seed funding from ESP Capital and Japanese IT Corporation Framgia Inc.
Hung Cao report on Vneconomictimes
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