Serbiz bets AI guides turn SEA's side-hustle culture into a gig marketplace

Serbiz is an AI-native gig marketplace, born in the Philippines and expanding through Vietnam, where users post or request side gigs — services, rentals, errands — while AI agents Earnie and Scout help both sides discover skills and needs.

SEA Gen Z will start side gigs if an app uses AI to tell them what to offer and what to ask for, so Serbiz bets on guided matching over traditional job boards

Two Gen Z Filipina founders — Iyana Argañoza (CEO) and Aliexandra Heart Po (COO), both former computer science batch presidents at De La Salle University — built Serbiz from a university project. It hit tens of thousands of users in the Philippines through TikTok virality and word of mouth, reaching top-3 App Store Business ranking.

Serbiz joined Antler's SEA Venture Launchpad in Ho Chi Minh City on 28 April 2025 and announced pre-seed investment from Antler Vietnam on 29 July 2025. In Vietnam it gained more than 30,000 users in four weeks with zero paid advertising — the team screenshot Vietnamese TikToks, translated them with ChatGPT and adapted trends — with average sessions near nine minutes, top-8 App Store Business ranking and 2,000+ user-generated listings.

Still running: preparing its next fundraising round after Antler's pre-seed, with Serbiz 2.0 planned — faster payments, improved AI agents and recognition programmes — and expansion to more Southeast Asian markets.

Traditional job platforms require users to know what they're good at and what they need; Serbiz's AI agents discover both, lowering the entry barrier for first-time earners.

Hustle culture is mainstream in the Philippines and Vietnam, giving Serbiz a dense, engaged user base that larger markets lack.

Marketing itself was the growth engine: two-person team, TikTok-native humor, no paid ads — 30,000 Vietnam users in four weeks cost almost nothing.

Antler's hands-on Launchpad model let the founders test Vietnam cheaply before committing to expansion.

When users can't articulate what they want, make discovery the product: AI that tells people what they could sell, plus platform-native marketing, can outgrow paid acquisition.

As of 6 August 2026, Serbiz had built an 80,000-strong user base without paid marketing, was operating in the Philippines and Vietnam with an AI matching layer (agents Earnie and Scout), and was preparing its next fundraising round after Antler's pre-seed. Its roadmap included Serbiz 2.0 with faster payments, improved AI agents and user recognition programmes, plus expansion to other Southeast Asian markets.