Singapore-based healthcare startup Ordinary Folk gets $5M to fight stigma

Ordinary Folk, a Singapore-based telehealth startup dedicated to men and women’s health issues, has raised $5 million in pre-Series A funding from Monk’s Hill Ventures. The funding will be used for hiring and expand into Hong Kong while scaling in Singapore.

Founded in 2020 by Sean Low, the startup has two main platforms: Noah is for men’s sexual health, mental wellness, hair care and weight management, while Zoey focuses on sexual wellness, fertility, mental health and wellbeing.

Low says he started Ordinary Folk to ease the pain points of an in-person clinical visit, while also making it easier to seek care for stigmatized conditions like erectile dysfunction.

“Men’s and women’s health conditions are intimate problems that affect all of us at some point of our lives, whether directly or through your partner,” he told TechCrunch. “And before we started Noah and Zoey, there weren’t any good solutions in Singapore and Hong Kong.”

The company chose Hong Kong as its next market to expand into because there are many similarities between Singapore and Hong Kong, Low added. For example, both are densely-populated and fast-paced, with healthcare systems that have the same issues, he said.

“While there are nuances, Singaporeans and Hong Kongers also identify similarly on issues such as high healthcare costs, fear of illegitimate medication, inconvenience of visiting a doctor and the stigma attached to men’s and women’s health conditions,” he explained.

Ordinary Folk says that since its launch, its revenue has grown by over 130% and it has had over a million unique visitors. It differentiates from other telemedicine startups by building a full healthcare stack, Low said, including healthcare and logistics for medication in non-description packaging.

This also means Ordinary Folk was able to create a health assessment patients take before scheduling an appointment, allowing doctors to make more detailed diagnoses.

“In the case of sexual health, having to answer intimate questions can be tough and what more to a stranger whom you’ve never met,” said Low. The health assessment was developed in partnerships with doctors and health experts. Ordinary Folk’s network of providers include physicians, psychologists, therapists and other specialists.

In a prepared statement, Peng T. Ong, the co-founder and managing partner of Monk’s Hill Ventures, said, “Millions of people across Asia find it difficult to access proper treatment and care for health conditions that have tremendous taboo attached. Through Noah and Zoey, Ordinary Folk is uniquely positioned to bring in value through the consumer journey of healthcare services, creating an ecosystem where patients have access to medical experts and products, and a wide range of treatment options.