Philippine parenting e-commerce start-up edamama closes $20m Series A funding

edamama, the Philippines’ leading parenting-focused e-commerce platform, has secured a $20 million Series A funding round led by Alpha JWC Ventures – one of Southeast Asia’s most prominent venture capital firms.

The oversubscribed fundraise is one of the Philippines’ largest early-stage rounds, and includes significant participation by edamama’s existing investors, notable among which are Gentree Fund, Robinsons Retail Holdings Inc. (RRHI), and Kickstart Ventures – affiliated with the Sy, Gokongwei, and Ayala families respectively, who collectively control the three largest shopping mall operators in the country.

Temasek affiliate Innoven Capital, Foxmont Capital Partners, and renowned angel investor Lisa Gokongwei-Cheng are also among edamama’s repeat investors in the round.

Launched in May 2020 by husband and wife founders Nishant D’Souza and Bela Gupta, edamama offers a personalized shopping experience through content, community, and commerce-driven strategies that simplify decision-making for parents.

Through its proprietary platform, edamama helps bridge the trust gap in the Philippine retail landscape for safe, authentic, and affordable parenting products and services. Since its launch, edamama has grown to fulfill tens of thousands of monthly orders with industry-leading average order values and customer retention rates.

The Series A funding was secured on the back of the 100x growth edamama achieved amidst the global pandemic, which precipitated the need for a safer and more trustworthy approach to digitally accessing products and services for families across the Philippines.

The startup has continued to maintain strong momentum, having delivered over 1.5 million products to Filipino doorsteps across the country, leveraging its embedded warehousing and logistics fleet.

edamama has also pioneered multiple market-first parenting innovations, including the country’s first online gift registry, subscription services for everyday essentials, and an integrated portal for content and services – with several more platform features in the pipeline.

This latest round is set to fuel the expansion of edamama’s operations, including same-day and next-day delivery solutions to more locations across Metro Manila and beyond. Further, the funding will be used to enhance the company’s content and community elements, launch its own offline stores and scale its private label portfolio.

“As parents, we want the best for our children. However, parents in the Philippines have limited options for quality products, and there is also a dearth of credible platforms for product reviews. edamama fills that buyer confidence gap by giving parents access to the best shopping experience with a wide range of quality SKUs, and trusted by a strong community that supports parents on their most exciting journeys,” stated Eko Kurniadi, Partner of Investments at Alpha JWC Ventures.