tier-2-cities
(2)
Trell
Trell was an India-founded lifestyle social commerce platform where users shared roughly three-minute vertical videos about their interests - travel, beauty, food, fashion and wellness - across eight regional languages. Started in 2016 by four IIT-Bombay friends, it grew a large community skewed toward Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities, then pivoted in 2020 into in-app shopping through 'Trell Shop.' It raised about $66 million from investors including Sequoia/Peak XV, KTB Network, Samsung Ventures, Mirae Asset and H&M, before a 2022 governance probe and cash crunch triggered mass layoffs and a steep revenue collapse.
RateS
RateS was a Singapore-born, Indonesia-focused social commerce platform that let anyone - housewives, students, small shop owners - start an online business with no inventory and no upfront capital. The app sourced products directly from suppliers and handled warehousing, logistics, payments and financing, while its network of micro-entrepreneurs handled sales through their social networks. Spun out of the foreign-exchange startup RateX, RateS grew to more than 500,000 resellers across Indonesia's tier-2 and tier-3 cities before being acquired by e-commerce enabler SIRCLO in 2023.