Hidden gems of our first cohort and how we discovered them
By: Impact Collective
Tags: Investment, Accelerator, Venture Capital, Impactcollective, Impact Investing

Hidden gems of our first cohort and how we discovered them Impact Collective Follow Aug 4 · 4 min read

From a Bangladesh mobility startup for female workers to a Pakistan telemedical startup led by women entrepreneurs — this is our story of creating a positive impact in underserved communities.

Impact Collective is Asia’s first and only community-driven investment and acceleration program for early-stage startups seeking opportunities in Asia-Pacific. During our first cohort in 2020, we accelerated 84 teams from 35 countries and invested in eight startups.

Recently, Dr. Iffat Zafar Aga(Co-founder and COO of Sehat Kahini) and Reyasat Chowdhury (CEO of Shuttle), both alumni from the 1st cohort, joined our Ask Me Anything #2: All About Investment session with Eunielle Yi, a partner from TheVentures. The three panelists talked about their investment journey and how IC discovered hidden gems through the program’s community-centered judging process.

Listen to AMA# 2 Investment Session to find tips and advice from alumni and partner

Introducing the two hidden gems

Shuttle is a mobility startup that provides safe transportation at an affordable price for female workers and young female professionals in Bangladesh. According to a study conducted by BRAC, 94% of Bangladesh women using public transportation have experienced physical, verbal, or some other forms of sexual harassment. Shuttle aims to ensure each and every woman in Bangladesh has the freedom to commute without fear of being harassed while also reducing gas consumption by developing a ride-sharing system and teaching women how to drive and hiring them as an employee. The solution currently has more than 25,000 female users registered, and before the pandemic, there were about 750 rides per day.

Sehat Kahani is operating a telemedical service providing opportunities to female doctors and clinical accessibility to female patients in underserved areas in Pakistan. They aim to democratize healthcare by creating an all-female healthcare provider network and e-health clinics. With its service, Sehat Kahini not only provides jobs for female doctors, who are struggling to find a job due to societal issues despite their high achievement in education but also enhances the rights of female patients. It currently has more than 5,000 female doctors online, serving 755 enterprises and 7.2 million employees and their families, and they have conducted 360K e-consultations which have led to 3.2 million beneficiaries in underserved communities.

How IC discovered the hidden gems — the power of collective intelligence

Impact Collective has a dedicated collective fund of USD 5 million backed by unicorn startups and seasoned entrepreneurs in Korea. The fund is managed by TheVentures, a Seoul-based early-stage VC, and IC usually invests USD 50K+ to USD 300K in pre-series A startups. The average monthly revenues of the final teams were approximately USD 75K per month, which means all the teams already had their own revenue streams and operating products/services from their respective markets.

Due to a lack of prior experience and market information on the new regions, Pakistan and Bangladesh were markets of higher risks for Impact Collective. As a result, they initially were not at the forefront of Impact Collective’s investment radar. However, thanks to our Impact Collective Community (ICC), which consisted of over 350 experts around the globe (now more than 1,100), we were able to gain a confident level of knowledge and market insight about the areas we may not have considered. Members of the community were sharing up-to-date market activities and elevated both Shuttle and Sehat Kahani by voting for them. The two teams eventually became top finalists of IC Cohort 1. Adding to Impact Collective’s funding, the two raised USD 3 million combined in the same round.

Through “collective intelligence” and giving power to the community, we were able to democratize venture investment in the Asia-Pacific region by discovering and investing in businesses that are creating a positive impact for underserved communities.

Curious about our community voting system? Read: ‘Who should we invest in next?’ and ‘Join Impact Collective 2021 as a community voter’

The biggest takeaways

According to Reyasat, the biggest takeaways were not only the financial investment but also the connections he was able to build through the program. Sessions with more than 30 mentors from various countries and industries gave him guidance that continues to help his team even to this day. Because Shuttle was outperforming their target goals, Shuttle has been funded by Impact Collectie once again as a follow-on in 2021.