We’re psyched to announce the first group of founders to join Surge, which kicked off in Singapore on March 25. Surge 01 2019 is comprised of an inspiring set of ambitious entrepreneurs who span eight nationalities, with headquarters in India, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Singapore and Indonesia.
Surge is our own startup journey, and we are learning as we go. The process of selecting our first group of Surge startups was exhilarating, humbling and painful at the same time. We were overwhelmed by the response we got but unfortunately had to say no to many wonderful entrepreneurs. We had originally thought we would start small, with perhaps 10-12 startups, as Surge was in ‘beta’. But we met so many incredible startups that the number of companies in Surge 01 grew to 17 – as a gesture of thanks to the founder community, we decided to try and include as many as we possibly could.
The docs are signed with each of the startups and we’re ready to tell you more about the 17 terrific companies that are a part of Surge 01 2019.
It is a wonderfully diverse group with founders from eight nationalities and headquarters in India, Indonesia, Singapore, Vietnam and Bangladesh. We’re super psyched that five out of 17 Surge 01 startups have at least one female founder. These startups span a wide range of sectors, including Travel and Hospitality, e-Commerce, Social Commerce, EdTech, Fintech/InsurTech, Consumer Brands, SaaS, HealthTech and B2B commerce.
They range from pre-launch to several that have terrific monthly or weekly growth momentum and in industry parlance, are simply “on fire” :-).
We designed Surge with an ‘open architecture’ in mind, so we could include other seed funds and angel investors, in order to better serve founders. Alongside Surge, approximately a dozen seed funds and institutional co-investors are joining the Surge rounds – tying in a total investment of USD 36 Mn across the 17 companies.
We couldn’t be more grateful to the founders who have chosen to give us a chance to be a part of their journey. With much gratitude and admiration, we present you Surge 01 2019.
[surgeahead-companies category=”surge-01″]
