Kredivo Bags 1.4 Trillion Rupiah Debt Funding from Victory Park Capital

The multi-finance startup Kredivo announced additional credit from a US-based investment company, Victory Park Capital Advisors, LLC (VPC) worth of $100 million (more than 1.4 trillion Rupiah). This is the VPC’s second time to top up with the same nominal for Kredivo, the first collaboration occurred in July 2020.

In a virtual press conference with media held by the company today (22/6), Kredivo Indonesia’s CEO, Umang Rustagi said that the funds will be fully channeled to Kredivo’s consumers in Indonesia in need for credit. The company plans to expand financing products beyond just cash loans and transactions on e-commerce platforms.

Positioned as a multi-finance company, Kredivo is preparing financing products for health, education, and vehicles. “The funds provided through this collaboration will be able to accelerate our business scale in 2021 and in the following years, also help achieve our target to serve 10 million customers in Indonesia by 2025,” Rustagi said.

Currently, Kredivo claims to have more than three million users in Indonesia. This number is equivalent to 40% of credit card users totaling 8 million people, after being deducted by an estimate that one person has more than one credit card.

“Kredivo’s consumer growth and disbursement needs in Indonesia are growing rapidly. Through our research, new users have been using the paylater for the past year,” Kredivo’s VP Marketing & Communications, Indina Andamari said.

Rustagi continued, VPC’s decision to top up credit at Kredivo was due to the large potential for the unbanked group in Indonesia. In addition, the company’s ability to maintain risk management and successfully become a sustainable business in the midst of a pandemic over the past year.

Separately, in an official statement, VPC’s Partner, Gordon Watson said, “We are very impressed with Kredivo’s resilience and business growth and are certainly very pleased to continue to strengthen our collaboration with Kredivo. The company represents a unique combination of growth, scale, risk management and financial inclusion in one of the world’s most attractive emerging markets.”

In addition to VPC, Kredivo has previously partnered with a number of local banks as institutional lenders, including Bank Permata with a value of IDR 1 trillion and Partners for Growth with a value of IDR 283 billion. Both institutions entered last year.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

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Justika Receives Seed Funding from East Ventures and Skystar Capital, Expanding Legal Services for Public

A marketplace for legal services, Justika announced an undisclosed seed funding led by East Ventures, with participation from Skystar Capital. The fresh funds will be used for product development, marketing and talent recruitment to provide added value to users.

East Ventures’ Co-Founder & Managing Partner, Willson Cuaca said the access to legal justice is still a big problem in Indonesia. This is due to the complex procedures and the lack of information about legal access.

“Justika has built a platform that can connect lawyers and clients, where they can use various available features. We believe that Justika will democratize legal access and help millions of Indonesians to better understand the law,” he said in an official statement, Tuesday (22/6).

Supporting Willson’s statement with a quote from the “Research Report on Access to Justice in Indonesia 2019” released by the Indonesian Judicial Research Society, Indonesian Legal Roundtable, and the Indonesian Legal Aid Foundation, around 110 million Indonesians have experienced significant legal problems in the last two years.

As many as 71% of them give up on finding solutions because the difficulty to gain access, either because they don’t know what to do or don’t know where to go. Despite these challenges, Justika believes that there is great potential in this industry. With the legal market estimated to be worth $7.5 billion, Justika plans to expand the user base and its product line.

Currently, Justika focuses on three legal areas often faced by the community, family law, law involving small and medium enterprises, and property law. The company plans to expand and provide access to other legal services the community needs.

“We plan to double our revenue by targeting 7,000 unique monthly paying users next year,” Justika’s Co-Founder and CEO Melvin Sumapung said.

Justika is a digital platform created to connect people who need legal services with lawyers and other support services, such as company establishment agents and translators. The Justika platform is not only innovating how people find lawyers, but also how lawyers work.

Justika uses natural language processing technology or NLP to match clients with attorneys based on service specialties. Once matched, clients can consult a lawyer and get a reply in less than five minutes.

Furthermore, lawyers can also provide other services depending on the client’s needs, such as review or drafting of documents, telephone consultations, negotiations, and advocacy in court. On the other hand, lawyers can easily establish connection with clients through Justika.

Justika is part of Hukumonline legal portal founded by Ahmad Fikri Assegaf, a senior partner at the firm AHP (Assegaf Hamzah & Partners). Ahmad also acts as a co-founder at Justika. Hukumonline now plays an important role in providing better access to justice through online databases, legal analysis, legal clinics, and news.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

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Mekari’s CEO, Suwandi Soh Talks About His Venture to Build Sustainable Business

Since the rebranding into Mekari in 2019, the SaaS platform that is focused on increasing employee and business productivity has become one of a few profit-oriented technology platform which is not provoked by the “burn money” scheme.

The pandemic that has accelerated technology adoption at various scales has triggered Mekari’s rapid growth. The company expanded its product line by acquiring the CRM service developer platform Qontak last month.

Mekari’s CEO, Suwandi Soh, who participated as the mentor for the online incubator program DSLaunchpad Ultra 2021, revealed that the rapid growth of the SaaS platform provides motivation for companies to develop sustainable businesses.

Mekari is also listed in the centaur list with a valuation exceeded $100 million.

Inspiring journey

In the early days before Mekari, Suwandi said that he had worked in several companies and noticed that many are still relied on conventional methods to monitor various types of data in terms of employee management. Manual recording and the use of spreadsheets make the process inflexible and less accurate.

He perceived the current condition and the huge opportunity for technology to solve this, Suwandi then began to introduce the HR management business model using software-as-a-service (SaaS).

“Previously I noticed there are many platforms that offered relevant technology to businesses to manage their employee and business management. However, most of them offer quite expensive prices and usually available for large companies. There are many small to medium-sized companies have not utilized that kind of software,” Suwandi said.

Entering the year of 2014-2015, services began to appear that offer SaaS for all. Suwandi used this momentum to introduce his products. This goes along the increasing penetration of the internet among the public.

“Starting from Sleekr [before rebranding into Mekari], we see an opportunity to explore further how to handle business needs and complete operations in the company for accounting, HR, also tax management using SaaS,” Suwandi said.

The micro, small, and big enterprises

(ki-ka) Anthony Kosasih - COO Mekari, Suwandi Soh - CEO Mekari, Daniel Witono - CPO Mekari Dalam Acara Pengumuman Konsolidasi Mekari 2019 / Mekari — (left to right) Anthony Kosasih – Mekari’s COO, Suwandi Soh – Mekari’s CEO, Daniel Witono – Mekari’s CPO in Mekari’s consolidation event 2019 / Mekari

Indonesia is a Southeast Asian country with the largest number of MSME players. Based on the Ministry of Cooperatives, Small and Medium Enterprises (KUKM) data in 2018, there are 64.2 million MSMEs that absorbs around 117 million workers or 97% of the national workforce. MSMEs contribution to the national economy (GDP) has reached 61.1%.

“It is said that Indonesia will become the 4th global country in terms of GDP in 2030. Indonesia should be able to grow bigger and become a world economic power. Now is the right time to invest and grow in Indonesia,” Suwandi added.

In terms of business segmentation, Suwandi notices a slight difference defined by Mekari. When talking about MSMEs, there are many who still consider warungs or small businesses that are run independently are MSMEs .He mentioned 5 structures related to this matter, micro, very small, small, medium and large. With the slight difference, he claims to still adhere the same perception as defined by the government using 4 structures (micro, small, medium and large businesses).

“The pandemic has shifted most of the business. Not only big, but also small [businesses] are starting to adopt SaaS technology. There are also those who are leveraging the cloud to make online collaboration easier with dispersed teams,” he said .

Mekari prioritizes software that provides value for business. These values are what Mekari offers for helping businesses increase productivity, business development, and accelerate business.

Currently the business model is a fully paid subscription. However, Mekari does not limited to free subscription with paid options for additional features.

The future of SaaS

Mekari University’s interface, with various courses of productivity software / Mekari

One of the advantages of SaaS startups, Suwandi said, is the benchmark that investors already understand. Venture capitalists and large companies feel comfortable investing in SaaS platforms, such as Mekari, because most of them are also companies included in the category.

“Overseas, the SaaS industry is very mature, in contrast to ride-hailing, which is relatively new. SaaS has a lot of understanding compared to other sectors, therefore, it does not become an obstacle for SaaS startups to later emerge and offer services to target users,” Suwandi said.

The high awareness also makes it easier for Mekari to implement a sustainable and profit-oriented business scheme. When you want to do marketing activities, for example, you will pay close attention to metrics such as LTV/CAC. While there is no definite recipe, it does provide an advantage for the SaaS platform to run a business.

“Speaking of sustainability and profitability, I think both are equally important. It is important for companies to be able to accelerate growth, but on the other hand, they can also earn profits and continue to survive,” Suwandi concluded.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

HappyFresh Aims to be All-in-One Marketplace for Grocery, Focusing on Partnerships and Consumer Experience

The pandemic has led to an unprecedented increase in several online services, including e-grocery, driven by mobility restrictions and offline shopping security concerns. Filippo Candrini, the Managing Director of HappyFresh Indonesia, the country’s leading marketplace for groceries confirmed this statement and break down some of the mechanisms in reaction to this transition.

“This pandemic has shifted the way many businesses operated. HappyFresh, as one of the first digital companies operating in the online grocery industry, has experienced a surge in service usage. It obviously becomes a growing trend since the pandemic started,” he said.

After one year of pandemic, HappyFresh managed to operate without stressful conditions. In a very short time, the company has doubled its fleet numbers, gained new consumers, and improved services. However, it is important to highlight the fact that the pandemic does not seem to fade away.

“What we’ve done, last year we did improve the backend and front-facing to help accommodate better, a feature that limited certain products in a mass quantity to avoid rhetoric purchases, contactless delivery, more payment methods, tested our fleet, all the things we’ve done and left continuing to do are basically have been stacked up on our plan,” Candrini added.

All-in-one marketplace for groceries

HappyFresh positioned its platform as the weekly or monthly groceries. The company declared to focus on groceries and not venturing in different verticals. The platform focused on catering to the largest portfolio of supermarkets in Indonesia with a nutritious selection of specialty stores and anything complementary to groceries.

“We don’t have any intention to become the super app, instead we want to be super at doing groceries for customers and our partners,” Candrini added.

In terms of target market, the platform intends to be a service that can cater to any customers. Not only for the middle to upper segment, but also the mass market. The demography also shows around 80% of its consumers are women aged 25-40 years. Working parents and single professionals also represent a large group of its customers.

“Many of our customers shopped online in 2020 for the first time, and they continue to do their weekly or monthly shopping today because they feel comfortable: our trained Personal Shopper and Rider partners will select and deliver groceries to their homes while they can dedicate time. for what they love most, forgetting the hassle of traffic, queuing or carrying heavy bags, and also enjoying unique online promotions,” Candrini told DailySocial in different occasion.

Convenience works different with each individuals, it can be delivery speed, price tag or detailed information. However, during pandemic it also means health security. Across all these spectrums, HappyFresh focused on delivering high-quality products and better consumer experience. It includes providing personal shopper and special packaging to ensure the product’s freshness.

HappyFresh is very strict on the quality of products they delivered. Therefore, most of the deliveries are made by its own fleet. They only pass the eligible order to trivial partners and it is said less than 5% of the total volume. In terms of product delivery, they currently partnered with Grab and Lalamove.

“We tried to be very personal with our products, therefore it’s important to create a very customized and personalized flow for each user,” Candrini added.

There are two main sources of monetization in this platform, service fees from partners and delivery fees from consumers. In that regard, the company will try to generate equal value for partnerships and consumers.

Earlier this year HappyFresh also launched a new rewards program. The system is quite simple: earn points for every order delivered and exchange it for a discount on the next purchase. Every order will get you closer to becoming a Gold member to get more exclusive benefits. Last April, the platform also includes OVO as a new payment method.

Aside from HappyFresh, there are also several platforms providing online grocery services with different value propositions, including SayurBox and TaniHub.

Expansion strategy

Aside from Indonesia, HappyFresh has also available in Malaysia and Thailand. With a mission to provide an online delivery service for household needs for all families in Southeast Asia, also to make life easier for many people, the platform is trying to reach a wider market by intensifying local expansion.

A recent study from Alpha JWC Ventures and Kearney predicts that tier two and three cities will account for 48 percent of e-commerce activity in Indonesia by 2025, up from 30 percent in 2020. Candrini said this is in line with HappyFresh’s commitment to continuously improve services that is available for all Indonesian households.

“Each city and service area requires a special approach. We have formed partnerships with local supermarkets and national retail companies, as well as held programs to raise awareness of the benefits and convenience of online shopping for the household needs (to the public and new users),” he added.

In Makassar, HappyFresh has established partnerships with several supermarkets, such as Lotte Mart, Hero, and Giant. While in Bogor, HappyFresh has partnered with Giant and Tip Top. In total, the platform has partnered with 400+ supermarket and available in 11 cities across Indonesia, including Jabodetabek, Bandung, Surabaya, Malang, Semarang, Makassar and Bali.

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Lemonilo Confirmed as a Centaur, Entering the List of Indonesia’s Startups with Valuation Exceeded $100 Million

The new economy startup, a healthy food products developer, Lemonilo, recently secured a series B funding. The new round has further strengthened the its valuation, listed the company as one of the centaurs. According to our source, Lemonilo’s estimated valuation has reached around $300 million or equivalent to 4.3 trillion Rupiah.

Regarding Lemonilo’s entry into the centaur list, it is also confirmed by one of the participated investors in the investment round.

Lemonilo’s current list of investors includes Alpha JWC Ventures, Unifam Capital, and Seqouia Capital. Previously, East Ventures was also involved in the seed funding, but already exited.

The startup was founded in 2015 by Shinta Nurfauzia, Johannes Ardiant, and Ronald Wijaya. From producing healthy alternatives for instant noodles, the Lemonilo product category has now expanded, including food ingredients, beverages, even skin care product brands.

In this segment, Lemonilo competes with other players. There are several new economy startups entering this segment. In terms of healthy noodles, the wellness startup The Fit Company also produces Fitmee product variants.

Lemonilo’s Co-Founder & Co-CEO Shinta Nurfauzia in an interview with DailySocial.id revealed, it is expected that instant noodle are still the favorite, but they admit that they have quite a large demand for other products such as snacks.

The company is currently focused on developing product innovation, including to present new flavors. It is said that they have launched more than 40 types of products to this day. All of these products are sold on its own digital platform and are available at more than 100 thousand distribution points in various parts of Indonesia — including utilizing its reseller network.

From the very beginning, Lemonilo leveraged its self-developed technology platform – a website and an application – for product distribution and promotion.

“The area with most of Lemonilo’s customers is still Java. Lemonilo’s target by the end of this year is to add more product variants for customers,” Shinta added.

She also said that the fresh funds obtained in the last round will be channeled to expanding and strengthening its product distribution network in Indonesia, increasing the number of teams, developing and launching new products, as well as developing technology to better serve users.

Lemonilo intends to fill the market gap between high-priced imported healthy products and FMCG companies in the market. Every product developed by Lemonilo has three pillars: healthy, practical and affordable. Using this standard, every Lemonilo product is guaranteed to be free from 100+ potentially harmful ingredients (such as preservatives, flavor enhancers, and various synthetic ingredients) that are often found in other consumer goods products.

In the 2020 Startup Report, we recorded that by the end of 2020 there are 43 Indonesian startups had listed in the ranks of the centaurs. There are 6 of them have entered the ranks of late-stage centaurs with a valuation of over $500 million.

Startup Centaur Indonesia 2020 — Indonesia’s centaur list 2020 / DSInnovate

Apart from Lemonilo, there are several startups has reached that certain valuation this year. Among those are BukuWarung, Ula, and BukuKas.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

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Bluebird Invests in Social Commerce Startup Dagangan’s Pre Series A Funding

Social commerce startup Dagangan announced a pre-series A funding with an undisclosed amount from a series of investors, including CyberAgent Capital, Spiral Ventures, 500 Startups, and Bluebird Group. This is the beginning round of series A funding that is expected to be closed soon.

According to the company’s official statement today (18/6), the fresh funds will be used to fuel the expansion to 7 thousand villages this year, therefore, more people in rural areas, far from shopping centers can get their daily needs.

CyberAgent Capital’s Managing Director Nobuaki Kitagawa said, “We believe that Dagangan can have a positive impact in helping and improving the economy of the community in tier 3 and 4 regions. “[..] With Dagangan team’s experience and in-depth knowledge of the FMCG industry, we believe that Dagangan will succeed in penetrating underserved local markets where highly inefficient supply chains and a lack of trust from local communities persist,” he said.

Dagangan is a social commerce application that provides various household needs, ranging from basic needs, fresh products, to other daily needs in retail and wholesale. The startup, which was founded in 2019, targets village stall owners who have had to travel 20 km-30 km to shop for daily needs.

“They are usually underserved by principal brands as they are far from urban areas and require help instead of having to close their shops for shopping within 20 km-30 km,” Dagangan’s Co-Founder, Wilson Yanaprasetya explained separately in a virtual press conference.

Dagangan has warehouses in various remote areas on Java Island as a hub and distribution channel in every village, involving local communities to solve distribution access problems in rural areas. Wilson continued, the entire Dagangan’s procurement process is carried out in two ways, taken directly from the principal brand and then stored in hubs, and taken directly from the product owner for products from MSMEs in the surrounding villages.

To date, not only providing household needs, Dagangan platform also sells various MSME products from snacks, kitchen spices, processed ready-to-eat foods, also making their own labels with affordable product prices.

Dagangan targets two types of consumers, shop owners as business actors who usually make large transactions and make purchases on the Dagangan application. Also, retail buyers, who are individuals intend to shop for daily necessities through the Dagangan Mall application. Products ordered by consumers will be delivered within 1×24 hours by its own fleet.

In addition to providing daily needs, Dagangan also partners with local entrepreneurs. Thus, they can improve their life quality through entrepreneurship. There are several hub partners that have joined. Currently, Dagangan operates in more than 4,000 villages spread across Yogyakarta, Central Java, and West Java.

Dagangan’s Co-Founder, Ryan Manafe added, with the current business model, his team is able to attract local community to grow together. “Dagangan is here to provide convenience to local communities in getting on with their daily economic activities. With the spirit of building the local economy, Dagangan offers a one-stop digital service solution to provide various household needs,” he said.

In the future, Dagangan is to expand to other village locations around Java. By the end of this year, it is expectd to be present in 7 thousand villages, 30 hubs, and 40 thousand active consumers.

“We are happy to listen to requests from the community regarding daily needs. If there is a high enough demand for an item, then we will look for them. We expect to become a reliable application for people in rural areas,” Ryan concluded.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

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Bukalapak Reportedly to Go Public in August 2021, Targeting up to 11 Trillion Rupiah Funding

The news of Bukalapak’s IPO is getting widely reported. Recently, a Reuters source said the company aims for an ambitious target of fundraising up to $800 million or equivalent to over 11 trillion Rupiah through the sale of 10 to 15% of the total shares; bringing the company’s valuation to $4 to $5 billion. The corporate action is said to take place in August 2021.

The source also mentioned that the estimated value obtained from the capital market is in accordance with the prospectus Bukalapak submitted to the Indonesia Stock Exchange. The changes will depend on investor’s demand and market conditions after successfully trading on the stock exchange.

The unicorn IPO debut will record a new milestone in Indonesia’s business landscape. In addition to being one of the listings with the greatest value over the past decade, it will also be the first among local unicorn startups. In terms of value, GoTo or Traveloka may overtake the position once they decided to register in Indonesia.

As previously reported, other unicorns have a tendency to prioritize going public on the New York stock exchange via SPAC. Bukalapak is also rumored to undergo the same act, after successfully go public on the local exchange.

Although currently backed with 47 shareholders, Bukalapak’s majority shares are controlled by three main institutions, including PT Kreatif Media Karya (31.9%), API Investment Limited (17.4%), and GIC Singapore through Archipelago Investment Pte Ltd (12 ,6%).

Value Proposition

Since it was founded in 2011 by Achmad Zaky, Fajrin Rasyid, and Nugroho Herucahyono — all three of whom are no longer active as the company’s executives– Bukalapak claims to have acquired more than 100 million users in Indonesia.

Various strategic innovations continue to be intensified, including the latest one regarding the plan to establish digital banking services with Standard Chartered, which is also an investor. Recently, the company has just completed its acquisition of the online marketplace platform Itemku, to expand its business in the digital game asset category.

Other features such as BukaPegadaian (B2B Commerce), Mitra Bukalapak, Buka Mutual Investment, and others are currently the company’s development focus. It is to present an additional value proposition than its competitors. Based on some research, Bukalapak is placed in third place after Shopee and Tokopedia.

In order to strengthen the company’s organizational structure, the company has also appointed Bambang Brodjonegoro and Yenny Wahid as company commissioners.

Last April 2021, Bukalapak closed its series G funding, the value of which was estimated to be over 5.7 trillion Rupiah. A number of investors were involved in this round, including UBS Group AG, Resorts World, Mandiri Capital Indonesia, BRI Ventures, and several previous investors.

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Coinomo Crypto Wallet Is Officially Launched Post Fresh Funding

Coinomo, a new company of Turn Capital’s acquisition over Dapp Pocket (Taiwan-based crypto wallet) and Cappuu (a yield aggregator service), announced fresh funding with an undisclosed value led by Vertex Ventures Southeast Asia & India (Vertex Ventures SEAI). Also, the beta version of the Coinomo application was released for the Indonesian and Taiwanese markets.

This round involved some investors, including zVentures (a Razer venture company), Spartan Group (a blockchain advisory and digital asset management company), Leo Cheng, and Venture Dao (a decentralized autonomous organization/community-based investment DAO consisting of business founders). Turn Capital’s previous investors also participated in this round.

Vertex Ventures SEAI’s partner, Genping Liu said, “We see an increase in interest and continuous innovative applications in the crypto space. Coinomo allows retail investors to easily participate in the ecosystem based on their investment profile return. This provides significant value by abstracting away complexity and confusion for the general retail user, while also reducing the risk of many projects.

“Vertex considers this as an infrastructure game to facilitate the further development of the cryptocurrency ecosystem. We have known and worked with Joseph and Evie for many years, therefore, we are delighted to be able to support them in this new venture.” Coinomo is Vertex Ventures SEAI’s second investment in the crypto industry after Binance Asia.

Razer zVentures’ Investment Director, Cho Weihao added, “Recently, cryptocurrencies have gained popularity among young people and millennials. As the world’s leading lifestyle brand for gamers, most of whom are millennials, Razer zVentures supports Coinomo’s efforts to create value in this area, as well as evaluating potential synergies.”

Coinomo’s CEO, Evie Zhang said the company wanted to bring its expertise in consumer products to Coinomo. In consumer products, it is closely related to two main elements, which is fun and easy to use. “We keep it in mind to apply to every detail and feature in our product designs.”

Coinomo App

Coinomo works closely with licensees in each country, aiming to become the largest and most used crypto gateway in Southeast Asia. In this region, there is a potential of more than 665 million people to be Coinomo users. Coinomo app’s beta version has a feature that allows users to trade cryptocurrencies and participate in yield products from various return on investment (DeFi) profiles.

With an intuitive interface that easily guides and directs users, they don’t have to spend days learning or getting comfortable with crypto products and spaces. In this beta version, Coinomo offers two product yields, providing a glimpse of more products in the future that are scalable, as well as compliant with a number of risk and return requirements from customers.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

Carro Announces Series C Funding and Unicorn Status, Stirring Car Marketplace Competition

The used car marketplace platform Carro today (15/6) announced Series C funding worth $360 million or equivalent to 5.1 trillion Rupiah. The round was led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2, participated by a number of investors including East Ventures. Carro claims to have reached “unicorn” status with this investment round, aka reaching a valuation of more than $1 billion.

This funding continues the previous ones the company secured for the last few years. In 2020, Carro received debt funding from a number of investors, following the series B round which was closed in the first quarter of 2019. From the seed investment in 2015 until 2020, Carro managed to reach valuation of around $291 million.

The investors involved include Alpha JWC Ventures, B Capital Group, NCore Ventures, Golden Gate Ventures, Endeavor Catalyst, Mitsubishi Corp, and a number of others. SoftBank Group had previously invested in Carro in 2016 through SoftBank Ventures Asia.

Carro is to channel the fresh funds to strengthen its market position and expand its products in the markets of Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore. Carro will also increase its financial services portfolio by expanding beyond in-house loan financing, as well as accelerating the development of AI capabilities.

Last April, Carro Indonesia stated that their services managed to record total sales of used car units of over 100% in Q1 2021 compared to Q4 2020. In terms of business as a whole, Carro claims to have posted revenue growth of more than 2.5x as of March 2021 and continued its positive EBITDA position for the second year in a row.

The next round, based on the founder’s statement to e27, the company is considering to go public. It is said that the plan will be finalized in the next 18-24 months.

Within its company group, Carro also oversees several digital platforms, such as Genie (Singapore), myTukar (Malaysia), and Jualo (Indonesia).

Market Competition

In the category of purchasing (C2B) and selling (B2C) used cars, Carro competes directly with Carsome — both are regional players with business bases in Indonesia and some countries.

The business model is similar, for C2B they buy consumer cars instantly by conducting thorough inspections. The company provides checkpoints at strategic locations — while purchase requests can be made via the website. The purchased cars are then sold to car dealership owners for re-marketing.

As for the B2C model, the cars that were successfully purchased and inspected were re-sold through their digital platform. The unique value offered is the result of inspection, considering that the goods being sold are used stuff. They also work with financial institutions to peddle credit schemes.

Based on an site visits analysis in Indonesia and Malaysia, Carsome is currently superior to Carro. In each country they operate different sites, such as in Indonesia: Carsome.id and Carro.id; as well as in Malaysia: Carsome.my and myTukar.com.

Carro vs Carsome stats in Indonesia:

myTukar vs Carsome stats in Malaysia:

In terms of funding, Carsome has secured a series D funding round from a number of investors at the end of 2020. From the seed round to the last round, Carsome’s estimated valuation has reached $250 million. Endeavor and the Mitsubishi unit were involved in financing Carsome and Carro.

A recent report published by DealStreetAsia says that Carsome is in the midst of seeking more than $200 million in new funding — and potentially turning them into the next unicorn.

According to company’s submitted data, in Q4 2020 Carsome managed to record the highest revenue, which was double the period before the pandemic. In addition, Carsome also managed to achieve group operational profitability in Q4 2020.

In Indonesia, there are also other players, OLX Autos (formerly BeliMobilGue) which has now been integrated with OLX’s services. The main focus is on buying cars from consumers — although some of the inspection products are currently starting to be sold through OLX and other online marketplace channels.

Carro and Carsome also promote an online-to-offline strategy by presenting outlets to assist the transaction process. Carro just launched the “Carro Automall Point” in April 2021, currently the used car showrooms are located in three areas around Jabodetabek. Meanwhile, Carsome has recently launched the “Experience Center” in early April 2021. For its own inspection points, Carsome has covered 15 cities in Indonesia.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

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Line Bank Is Officially Available in Indonesia, in Collaboration with Bank Hana

KEB Hana Bank Indonesia (Hana Bank) and LINE Corporation officially launched LINE Bank by Hana Bank (LINE Bank) in Indonesia yesterday (10/6) which was marked by the launch of its application for public. Indonesia is LINE Bank’s third market, following Thailand (LINE BK) and Taiwan (LINE Bank).

Collaboration between the two companies started in October 2018, when LINE Financial Asia acquired 20% stake in Hana Bank through an equity participation agreement. This was the beginning of the first foreign digital banking service, between banks and technology companies.

“LINE Bank will be available in the Indonesian financial industry to provide digital banking services that are convenient and easy to use. [..] LINE Bank will provide various financial products and fintech services that are tailored to the needs and interests of our customers,” Hana Bank’s President Director, Jong Jin Park said in an official statement, Friday (11/6).

LINE Financial Asia’s COO, Young Eun Kim added, “We will do our best through the collaboration of LINE and Hana Bank, therefore, Indonesian people can use LINE Bank and enjoy more convenient financial services.”

LINE Bank will provide financial services to a wider customer segment, including Generation Z as the majority of LINE users. The entire registration process of a new Hana Bank customer who want to create a LINE Bank account is done through the application, a debit card will be sent after the process is complete.

LINE Bank focuses on providing retail banking services, including deposits, savings and transfers. For savings, LINE Bank offers free transfer fees, cash withdrawals, and monthly admin fees. The balance currently available to be used to pay electricity and credit bills.

All LINE Bank transaction notifications are connected to the LINE Messenger application. Meanwhile, for deposit products, LINE Bank offers savings starting from IDR 1 million with competitive yields.

In Thailand, for example, LINE collaborated with Kasikornbank (KBank) to offer special rate account openings with interest rates up to 1.5% per year and debit card applications. This whole process is done through the LINE app, therefore, users don’t have to switch apps or remember another account numbers.

In addition, the Credit LINE personal loan product can be applied at any time, the approval process is faster, therefore, the money can be immediately disbursed. In the future, LINE BK will offer a wider variety of financial solutions, such as insurance products and financial investments.

It is said that LINE BK is able to reach more than 2 million users in February 2021, four months after its debut. As many as 50 thousand new savings accounts are opened every day and the number of transactions has exceeded 21 billion Bath (approximately 9.8 trillion Rupiah).

After Indonesia, Thailand, and Taiwan, LINE Bank’s next step is to enter Japan, as one of the largest LINE user base countries.

More banks are offering fully digital services to attract new digital savvy and mass market customers. The ability to mix financial products that are in line with target consumers is considered an effective move.

OJK reports that there are currently seven banks in the process of licensing to become digital banks. Those are Bank BCA Digital, BRI Agro, Bank Neo Commerce, Bank Capita, Bank Harda Internasional, Bank QNB Indonesia, and Bank Hana.

In addition, there are five banks that already established as digital banks. Those are Bank BTPN, Wokee from Bank KB Bukopin, Digibank owned by DBS Bank, TMRW from Bank UOB, and Jago owned by Bank Jago.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

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