2014
The Itch
Struggling to share personal growth tools with Portuguese friends, our founder, João Machado, recognizes that personal development courses (online) are readily available in English but scarce in Portuguese. He gathers two friends (Nuno and Tiago) around an old office table to fix that gap.
In late July 2014, Dharma5 was born.
2015
First Movers
We pioneer the Portuguese market. With early team passion , deep digital marketing roots and conections to part of the Mindvalley.com team, we quickly grew into Portugal's largest personal development platform. We start experimenting with how online education can feel more human.
2016
Cracking the Code
We prove that great learning experiences also sell out. By fusing education with community building, our courses hit #1 in Portugal and reach the top 5 bestsellers in Brazil. We aren't just selling information anymore; we are creating belonging.
2017
The VC Era
As we were born in one of Europe’s top incubators (IPN), our growth catches the eye of investors. We raise venture capital with the intention of amplifying our impact and scaling our authors' reach globally.
2018
The Paradox of Scale
Scaling brings a hard lesson. We peak externally, but the internal "magic" gets diluted by the pressure to grow fast. We launch international retreats to reconnect with what truly matters: genuine human connection.
2019
All In
Our events keep selling out. As VC-backed there´s only one way to go, hyperscale. We double down on our vision, going for massive international expansion, both online and offline. We are ready to take the world by storm.
2020
The Collapse
COVID changes everything. International retreats are canceled for 2 years; studio recording becomes impossible. The world stops, our numbers collapse.
2022
The Crossroads
We face a binary choice: Raise another round, or rebuild from the ground up? Investors say no, making only one option possible. We take time to reflect and later make the difficult decision to close our online academy.
2023
The Great Reset
We go into a near-shutdown, spending the year in the quiet, figuring out exactly who we are and what we want to do next.
2024
A Conscious Future
We decide to remain independent- transforming into a holding of focused brands built for the next decade, focusing on the human experience.
2025
The Reunion & The Pilots
Most of our core team - the marketing and learning experience that defined the industry a decade ago - returns. They bring their own solo projects with them. We pilot them, and three clear winners emerge: The Catalysts, Growth Community, and Dharma5 Labs.
2026
We´re Back
We center everything on what moved us from the very start: Human Experiences. With the pilots proven and the team reunited, we are back!