Superangel + Tribe Theory
I’m excited to announce Superangel’s first investment in Asia.
We’re leading a $1mSGD round in Tribe Theory, a global chain of startup hostels, targeted at travelling entrepreneurs, headquartered in Singapore. Co-investors in this round are Singapore-based investment firms REAPRA and Aurum Investments.
Tribe Theory is different from a typical technology investment, but in another way, it fits perfectly.
In a nutshell — it’s a chain of hostels, hotels, and in Bali’s case, a resort-like startup village — with each location having a vibrant co-working space and an awesome team that runs startup events. To tie it all together, they also have an online community that provides matchmaking, jobs, investment, networking and other value-add for startup founders who have stayed at Tribe Theory.
Tribe Theory is built on an idea that when we travel, we don’t just want a place to stay. We want a place where we can meet like-minded people from around the world who are on the same entrepreneurial journey. We want to build meaningful connections with them. I’m impressed how each place is unique, but at the same time deeply embedded in the local startup community. Simply put, Tribe Theory is building a new category in hospitality.
When making early stage investments, we at Superangel get most excited about passionate founders who have a drive to build a global business in a fast-growing market. In Tribe Theory's case, founders passion and founder-market fit have also been backed up by incredible progress since their launch a little more than a year ago.
I first met Vikram Bharati, founder of Tribe Theory last fall in Singapore and soon realised that he is the perfect founder to build this kind of business. A few years ago, he had quit his corporate job at JP Morgan Chase in Los Angeles, California to travel as a backpacker and digital nomad in 50 countries across 6 continents. He finally settled in Singapore, advised a number of startups, and last year embarked on a journey to realise his vision as an entrepreneur, building exactly the kind of business he himself would have used while travelling as digital nomad.
With already five locations opened in the first year (Singapore, Bangalore, Hong Kong, Yangon and Bali) and strong results from each of these, we have a very strong confidence that Vikram and his team will deliver on their ambitious vision of expanding to 10 countries in 2019 and 50 countries by 2028.
Their next location, and the first one outside of Asia will be in Tallinn, Estonia, opening in May in Tallinn Old Town.
Stay tuned and check them out: http://tribetheory.com
