Grab’s former Vietnam top exec bags $3 mln pre-seed for 10-minute grocery deliveries

The capital was funded by Global Founders Capital (GFC), Sequoia Capital India, Venturra Discovery, and Saison Capital.

Rino, which stands for right now, will use the funds to expedite its blueprint for 10-minute instant delivery by setting up hundreds of “dark stores”, a retail distribution centre or warehouse that caters exclusively to online shoppers.

Meal deliveries in Vietnamese cities typically take less than half an hour, but grocery deliveries are lagging behind, sometimes taking up to two to three hours, Rino founder Trung Thanh Nguyen told TechCrunch.

By creating a vertically integrated logistics infrastructure centered around “dark stores,” or stores set up for order fulfillment only, Trung says Rino can cut grocery delivery times down to just 10 minutes.

Before starting Rino, he was part of the founding team and chief operating officer of Baemin Vietnam, one of the country’s largest food delivery apps. Before that, he served as Grab Vietnam’s head of GrabBike and GrabExpress.