Singapore-based Intellect announced today (January 25) that it has closed a Series A round, in which it raised US$10 million.
The oversubscribed round was led by New York-based HOF Capital and participation from new investors including Headline, East Ventures, MS&AD Ventures, DG Daiwa Ventures, Pioneer Fund, as well as existing investor Insignia Ventures Partners.
Other notable angel investors this round included ShopBack co-founder and CEO Henry Chan, Cathay Innovation’s Rajive Keshup, former Headspace VP of Engineering Neel Palrecha, US unicorn Forge co-founder Samvit Ramadurgam, Peak co-founder Sagi Shorrer, Snap Inc. Director of SEA Anubhav Nayyar, Tinder & Match Group GM of SEA Gaurav Girotra, along with family office funds of billionaire founders.
This brings its total funding to US$13 million (S$17.5 million), following its US$2.2 million Pre-Series A and US$800,000 seed funding rounds.
The fresh injection of funds will be used to rapidly scale its offerings and team as it expands across Asia.
Intellect is looking at growing its product offerings to serve the entire spectrum of mental healthcare, from self-care programs to live counselling, coaching, and crisis management care. As part of this expansion, it is also actively hiring across its product, engineering and commercial teams now.
Strong demand for mental healthcare in Asia
Founded in 2020 by Theodoric Chew, Intellect is dubbed to be the largest and fastest-growing mental health startup in Asia. In just under two years, it has served over three million users and provides coverage across 20 countries.
Intellect offers an end-to-end, 24/7 mental healthcare system in a single app. It has a mental health benefits solution for employers that features clinical-based digital therapy programs along with telehealth services, connecting employees to a panel of licensed coaches and clinical therapists within minutes.
The company also has a consumer version of the app which offers an introductory mental wellbeing platform, carrying self-guided cognitive behaviour therapy programs.
In particular, COVID-19 has exacerbated the global mental health crisis, with close to one-third of Asia’s remote workers admitting that the pandemic has increased burnout at work. According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), mental health issues cost the global economy US$1 trillion per year in lost productivity.
Cognisant of COVID-19’s impact on the workforce, employers in Asia Pacific (APAC) are redefining employee care, enhancing their healthcare and wellbeing programmes, according to a Willis Towers Watson survey.
Two in five APAC employers planned to enhance mental health services and stress or resilience management while a quarter will prioritise providing access to affordable and high quality mental health services. More than 80 per cent of organisations have promoted EAP and online mental health services for employees during the pandemic.
Last year, Intellect saw its year-on-year revenue surge by over 20-fold, with a major uptick in enterprise clients signing on to its corporate mental health benefits solution, such as foodpanda, ShopBack, Singtel, Kuehne & Nagel and Schroders, amongst others.
Intellect also partners with leading insurers and global benefits brokers across Asia to offer mental health solutions on a much larger scale.
“It is very clear that there is growing demand for mental healthcare in Asia that will surge even higher in the new normal. At the same time, existing mental health benefits and mental healthcare systems are under equipped to service this surging need at scale,” said Theodoric.
“Intellect goes beyond supporting workforces, going deeper into our broader vision of building an entirely new mental healthcare system tailored specifically for Asia. We’re honoured to be leading this charge with the support of investors and partners.”
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Featured Image Credit: Intellect