Kilo

Kilo, a Vietnamese business-to-business e-commerce platform, was established in 2020 with the mission of digitizing the country's traditional retail supply chain. The company was founded by Kartick Narayan, an e-commerce veteran with a wealth of experience from senior leadership roles at major international companies like Amazon, Groupon, and Coupang, as well as being the former chief business officer at one of Vietnam's largest e-commerce platforms, Tiki. This background provided him with deep insights into the challenges and opportunities within Vietnam's retail sector, which is predominantly composed of micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) that account for approximately 80% of all retail purchases.

The Ho Chi Minh City-based startup developed a marketplace platform to connect wholesalers and distributors directly with retailers. Kilo's core service was a one-stop-shop app that allowed small and medium-sized shop owners to browse a wide assortment of goods, see transparent pricing, check stock details, and place orders. This model was designed to help retailers optimize their inventory turnover, thereby saving costs and reducing the risks associated with traditional, offline procurement methods. Furthermore, the platform enabled business owners to manage their operations across various sales channels, including popular social platforms like Facebook and Zalo. By digitizing these transactional flows, Kilo aimed to bring efficiency to a highly fragmented and manual supply chain.

The company gained early traction and investor confidence, securing an undisclosed seed funding round in early 2021 from investors including Goodwater Capital and January Capital. This was followed by a significant $5 million pre-Series A funding round in November 2021, co-led by Altos Ventures and January Capital, with participation from other notable investors. At its peak, the platform served tens of thousands of wholesalers and retailers across numerous provinces in Vietnam. However, despite its initial growth and ambitious plans to expand its services to include financing and logistics, Kilo ceased operations in October 2023, with its business registration status listed as temporarily closed.

Keywords: B2B e-commerce, Vietnam retail, MSME digitization, wholesale marketplace, supply chain technology, Kartick Narayan, retail procurement, inventory management, digital commerce, Southeast Asia tech, venture capital, Altos Ventures, January Capital, traditional retail, e-commerce platform, Ho Chi Minh City startup, supply chain optimization, retailer tools, online wholesale, Vietnamese economy