The worldwide pandemic put a highlight on folks’s craving for wellness and well-being. Niremia Collective, a Silicon Valley–primarily based enterprise capital agency, is tapping into that — and the gender disparity in VC — with its first fund of $22.5 million in capital commitments.
Niremia Collective is the most recent women-led debut fund, becoming a member of others like New Fare Partners and Curate Capital, Pact, Double Down and f7 Ventures.
Founders Naoko Okumoto and Nichol Bradford met in 2018 and labored on varied initiatives earlier than coming collectively as buyers to help startups on the pre-seed and seed phases centered on well-being expertise.
Niremia received its identify from the mix of “iremia,” which means a state of peace and tranquility in Greek, and the primary letter of the founders’ names.
“Human happiness and health should be at the center of the world,” Okumoto informed TechCrunch. “We are born to be happy, and we want humans to be the best version of themselves. Making an investment into technology enables people to tap into that human potential.”
Okumoto, who spent 17 years working with giant tech firms, has a storied historical past of investing and constructing companies within the U.S. and Japan. She was beforehand managing U.S. funding and collective affect neighborhood constructing for Mistletoe Enterprise Companions, a social affect fund based by Taizo Son. Okumoto was additionally the CEO of Amber Bridge Companions, an advisory agency specializing in cross-border enterprise growth, funding and operations.
Bradford, who additionally labored in tech and enterprise constructing, went into the online game enterprise, working at Disney Interactive and Vivendi Video games. Whereas in company technique at Vivendi, she was a part of the deal crew within the Activision Blizzard merger with Microsoft. She can also be the founding father of Transformative Tech, touted as “the world’s largest ecosystem in well-being technology” with some 9,000 members throughout 72 international locations.
Mistletoe Enterprise Companions is among the restricted companions of the brand new fund and is joined by home and worldwide companies and institutional buyers, together with Shionogi Prescribed drugs and MIXI Inc.
Because the global wellness market is poised to achieve $8.5 trillion by 2027, Niremia Collective intends to offer capital and administration sources to high-growth well-being startups. As well as, the agency needs to incubate new companies and be a useful resource for these planning to enter the sector.
“We invest in mental, social and emotional well-being as well as human purpose and performance,” Bradford mentioned. “All of this is human potential and technology. It’s how we heal, thrive and reach our highest potential as human beings. You have to have mental health to be able to do that.”
Niremia Collective has made 12 investments from its debut fund thus far. These embody Feno, which gives AI-powered oral care providers; Tripp, a VR/XR wellness platform; and DeepWell, which focuses on psychological well being therapy utilizing gaming.
