Traveloka Announces New Funding Worth of 3.6 Trillion Rupiah

Traveloka, today (7/28) announced the latest funding worth of US$250 million or equivalent to 3.6 trillion Rupiah. There are no further details on who participated, but EV Growth is one of the previous investors confirmed to be involved in this round. This investment is to focus on build up the company’s balance sheet while strengthening several product lines amid the Covid-19 pandemic.

This funding is previously reported by several media since early July 2020. Rumor has it that some investors, including Siam Commercial Bank, FWD Group, GIC, and East Ventures, mentioned involved in the final stage of negotiations for Traveloka’s follow-on funding. Reuters also says the Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) is leading the current round.

In this round, Traveloka’s valuation is estimated to drop at $2.75 billion (nearly 40 trillion Rupiah). The down round action was taken due to the company’s business struggle by Covid-19 and the declining traction.

“This is a major crisis in the current time, both in terms of finance and humanity. This situation is a form of re-adjustment that forces business people to rethink their plans, strategies, and business models. The travel industry is experiencing hard times that have never happened before, including Traveloka. The management team has made quite difficult efforts, including restructuring and optimization, to minimize the financial risks. We are confident that Traveloka will rise again stronger after going through this crisis,” Willson Cuaca said as Managing Partner EV Growth involved in this round.

Hardships during Covid-19 pandemic

Covid-19 has brought the OTA business experience a difficult challenge. Public transportation freeze, various destinations are closed; transactions declined. For Traveloka and many other OTA players, this has been the worst condition in their history.

Traveloka’s partners in the transportation, accommodation, activities, and restaurant sector also having some difficulty. In terms of transportation, consumer demand dropped dramatically while demand for refunds jumped significantly; the hotel business experienced the lowest occupancy rate ever; lifestyle partners in domestic and regional and restaurant partners must temporarily close their business operations.

“It can’t be denied that Traveloka is very affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. Our business is at its lowest point since we first started. However, we always believe that Traveloka will bounce back with the rapid adjustment of business strategies, working together with industry partners and other stakeholders, and continue to deliver innovative products to users as our main focus,” Traveloka’s Co-founder and CEO, Ferry Unardi said.

Struggling for business sustainability

In order to sustain, Traveloka applied some steps to optimize business, make savings, and refocus to prepare strategies to welcome the new normal. In Indonesia and Vietnam, for example, Traveloka finds the domestic sector, travel or short-range entertainment activities are getting back to normal and restore business, along with the high level of public awareness of pandemics and lifestyle adjustments to the current situation.

Various initiatives were launched to answer consumers’ changing demand, such as the Covid-19 Test service combined with airline tickets, booking hotel vouchers with flexible stays through “Buy Now Stay Later”, the Online Xperience program featuring popular hosts, the Traveloka LIVEstyle live stream program Flash Sale, as well as the Traveloka Clean campaign that allows users to place orders through Traveloka more convenient and secure.

“I am pleased to say that from a business standpoint, we are seeing a gradual recovery in all of our main markets. The Traveloka business in Vietnam has begun to stabilize and is approaching the period before Covid-19, while our business in Thailand is now almost beyond 50% compared to normal situations. “Even though Indonesia and Malaysia are still in the early stages of recovery, both markets continue to show promising momentum with week-to-week progress, especially for the line of accommodation business with the emergence of a short-term vacation stay or staycation,” Ferry added.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

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Lawgo Introduces Marketplace App for Lawyer Service

The demand for legal services in Indonesia is quite high. It is also shown in the number of local legaltech and regtech startups that increase over time. The high-demand and not-inclusive law services have inspired Lawgo as legaltech.

Lawgo was founded in November 2018 with Luki Amalah as founder and CEO. The service was launched as a mobile application in last year’s first half, but they re-released the application this month. Luki said the reason he created Lawgo was that public access to fair and transparent law enforcement was not really inclusive.

“We’ve seen Indonesia, in particular, many people are quite oppressed or have lost their rights, yet doing nothing because they don’t really know where to go or what to do to for this issue,” Luki said.

Product and business model

Lawgo runs B2C business model as a marketplace. With the current platform, users can search and use legal consulting services of some lawyers. The types of legal services they provide are also quite diverse ranging from mediation, criminal defense, advocacy, debt problems, to divorce.

Luki said that Lawgo made revenue by taking fee from each transaction that occurred. This fee is included in the price of the services offered to customers.

“For any lawyer who wants to join to become a Lawgo partner and submit their profile on our application, it’s free, but when they start accepting clients through our application, then the amount of fee they receive will be deducted for the Lawgo fee portion,” Luki explained.

To date, there have been quite a few lawyers partners who joined Lawgo, while the number of their app downloads has reached over 1000. There are at least two Lawgo’s leading features, Chat with Lawyer and Meet the Lawyer.

Both features have a fixed rate. Chat with Lawyer costs around Rp. 17,500 to Rp. 30,000 for one 20-minute session. While the Meet the Lawyer feature (to be released soon) will cost around Rp. 300,000-Rp. 500,000 per consultation.

“The different rate based on the lawyer classification, young and senior based on experience,” Luki added.

Short-term target

As a relatively new startup, Luki said education, introduction, and branding to the market are still Lawgo’s main focus. They also intend to develop new features to enrich their services. One of them is a feature that allows lawyers to assist clients to get right to court.

Luki saw the pandemic as an opportunity for Lawgo’s legal services to be more widely known by the public. The reason, the community’s concern about Covid-19 limits the movement of some people. That means that legal services based on the mobile application Lawgo could potentially be used by more people.

Thus, it is not surprising when Luki said Lawgo, a bootstrap startup, is yet to raise funding. “We’ve thought about fundraising, but it’ll not before early next year, mainly because our focus is more on brand and product introduction, also education to the public about the Lawgo service,” Luki concluded.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

Gojek’s Initiatives for Its Southeast Asia’s Business Amid Pandemic

Gojek is one of Indonesia’s digital startups in which business penetration reached regional. GoViet was launched in 2018, but GET was launched in 2019. Then, they arrived in Singapore. Previously, Gojek had the opportunity to test online motorcycle taxi services in Malaysia with a local player, Dego Ride.

Earlier this year the company has announced business plans, including strengthening its services abroad. Afterall, the Covid-19 pandemic puts significant pressure on businesses around the world, including Gojek.

DailySocial had the opportunity to talk with Gojek’s Head of Corporate Communications, Audrey Petriny. She explained, the GET, GoViet, and Gojek business models are quite adaptable to the current conditions. Some services actually have a good impact on society. Gojek already launched food-delivery services and digital wallets in foreign countries, such as GET Food in Thailand or Go Food in Vietnam.

“Because people stay at home and place more orders in the past few months, we see ongoing resilience in the online trading business (food and package delivery), non-cash payments, and digital content. Consumers are increasingly interested in this digital habit, even before Covid-19. Nowadays, online services become a daily necessity,” Audrey said.

However, there has been a decline in transportation transactions in the past few months. The biggest one is at the beginning of the pandemic in March-April 2020. Partners have decreasing orders. Various efforts were made to maintain the resilience of this business ecosystem and hope to recover quickly when entering a phase of adaptation to new habits.

“In March, we established Gojek Partner Support Fund to support partners’ income stability across markets. We have also implemented several other initiatives to provide financial or social assistance to drivers, including ongoing food distribution programs, financial partnerships to provide vehicle installment relief or low-interest loans and a consumer activation program to increase tips for driver partners,” Gojek’s representative said the initiative.

Cashless payment penetration

Similar to Indonesia, Gojek’s overseas partners are increasing, not only the driver. They also embraced merchant to enliven the market locations provided in the application. Pandemic is actually seen as an opportunity to be more active in bringing merchants into the platform to keep the business going. Various programs have been performed to encourage the digitalization, including digital payment systems.

“We also make adjustments and introduce new services, such as GET Pay in Thailand for food delivery, delivery without direct contact, [and] to ensure that consumers’ needs are safely delivered,” Audrey continued.

GetPay Thailand — GET Pay Thailand / Gojek

Currently, Gojek has only applied digital payment services in Thailand (GET Pay). The plan to expand Gojek’s fintech services has been scheduled, including in subsequent transit countries, such as the Philippines. In the Philippines, Gojek has already acquired the local company Coins.ph.

Another strategy is to increase promotion programs to maintain consumer demand while reducing the operational costs of merchant partners. The shifting of consumer’s needs is answered by improving services, such as accommodating basic needs shopping through applications – including selling ready-to-cook food.

Being mentioned about the company’s efforts to ensure its partners are safe from the transmission of Covid-19, Gojek team said that they have made various adjustments to the rules.

“To ensure driver partner’s safety and hygiene, also to provide consumers with greater assurance, we provide online training and cleaning equipment for all partners. We also make amendments to SOPs. This includes sending food without contact to ensure proper physical and sanitary measures. for the driver’s partner vehicle.”

Independent brand

As previously reported, to accelerate the adoption of Gojek services abroad, the company plans to rebrand GET and GoViet to “Gojek”, including to launch a single application. It was directly announced by the Head of International Gojek Andrew Lee.

In his statement, Andrew said this decision had been planned for several months and taken to facilitate the company to be able to increase the business scale more efficiently.

Previously, when launching GoViet and GET, the ex-CEO, Nadiem Makarim said that the local element was very important to advance business in a new country. He considers the use of different names more easily accepted by the local community. The assumption turned out to be different.

The use of a single brand and application has been applied by Gojek since its expansion to Singapore in late 2018.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

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Sinar Mas Land and Nakama Introduced Startup Heroes in BSD City

The development of the Indonesian startup ecosystem continues to show positive things. It is shown through the emerging new startups even during a pandemic. It is also proven by the number of seminars and short classes to help founders to better understand the procedures and steps in making startups.

In addition, some competitions were held for these new startups, both by the government and private parties (companies). However, one problem arises that after attending a series of seminars and competitions, there are many new startups still don’t have access to the next stage, especially related to the funding. In answering this problem, Sinar Mas Land and Nakama Connecting created a Startup Heroes started from last Saturday (7/25).

The first Bootcamp program amid a pandemic

In collaboration with Nakama, Sinar Mas Land held the first Bootcamp program called Startup Heroes followed by more than 500 startups and 1000 founders. The initiators of this program are Temmy, Iga Alma, Thomas Ardi, and Hendri Chen from Nakama. They have experience running several Impactpreneur seminars, startups, and community builder seminars.

In the series, participants will receive training and one-on-one mentoring with 30 experts for 3 months. It is to finalize ideas before the meeting with potential investors to be held in October. This event also supported by Amazon Web Services (AWS), Intel, DailySocial.id, Techinasia, and Kejora Venture in the implementation.

“This Bootcamp program will provide an opportunity for every startup participant to get one-on-one monitoring with mentors in accordance with the related field. Nakama will facilitate, foster, and gather the leading startups with investors,” Temmy said from Nakama.

startup heroes — Startup Heroes series followed by health protocol

This is also the first bootcamp program held during the COVID-19 pandemic. It means, the event should be followed by certain health protocol to support them with a face-to-face meeting. The first face-to-face event was held on Saturday (7/25) at The Breeze’s BSD City semi-outdoor atrium and limited to 44 selected founders. Other participants who can’t directly attend this face-to-face event can still follow through the Zoom application online.

Providing Digital Hub as a space for the digital community

As a sponsor for the Startup Heroes event, Sinar Mas Land is actively contributes to the development of Indonesia’s startup ecosystem. Also, through this bootcamp event, Sinar Mas Land has made a serious move to support the development of digital technology that is also manifested in the form of 26 hectares Digital Hub area in BSD City. It is to be dedicated as a research and education center for startups to multinational companies engaged in digital and technology. The Digital Hub Project Leader from Sinar Mas Land, Irawan Harahap, expected Sinar Mas Land through the Startup Heroes program can support young talents and the digital community to grow amid the Covid-19 pandemic.

A massive digital transformation drives Sinar Mas Land to build BSD City as a digital ecosystem. It is believed to bring its own challenges and require other parties such as governments, corporations, and startups to join and form a cohesive digital ecosystem. In order to accelerate this vision, BSD City is to prepare its area as a digital talent pool with national and international-based digital schools based.

“In a general note, technology is obviously required for increasing online activities. This program becomes a serious form to continue enriching the Digital Hub ecosystem and develop an integrated smart digital creative city in BSD City,” Irawan said.

The complete facilities offered by Digital Hub has attracted all technology industry players in the domestic and international markets. Ranging from interactive meeting rooms, 3D printing machines, gaming rooms, VR rooms, to segways can be utilized by all tenants. The facilities and infrastructure prepared for the Digital Hub are also a serious move of Sinar Mas Land to build an integrated smart digital city that is capable to contribute to people’s lives and the country’s economy.

Disclosure: This article is a sponsored content by Sinar Mas Land

Partipost Arrives in Indonesia to Accommodate Marketing Influencer’s Demand

Partipost expands its business to the Indonesian market with a digital platform for influencers. The platform is to bridge popular influencers with brands who want to launch marketing activities and take advantage of their services. Partipost is actually a Singapore based startup running a regional expansion.

Partipost’s COO Benyamin Ramli told DailySocial, the company was founded by two colleagues, Jonathan Eg (CEO) and Tony Jen (CFO); they intend to accommodate brands with influencers to encourage ‘word of mouth marketing’.

“First, we saw that the usual advertising is getting less effective. People have a mindset to avoid ads at all cost, they even use adblock, skip YouTube ads, also existing billboards and advertising is no longer gaining trust. After some surveys and research, we found that they prefer the recommendations of trusted influencers,” Benjamin mentioned.

Based on the Influencer Marketing Hub report, influencer marketing is projected to grow to US$ 9.7 billion by 2020. Digital consumer activity using social media has increased rapidly in the last two years, as brands and governments direct almost all of their marketing activities online to target millennials and the rising digital consumers.

To date, Partipost has 200 thousand users in Indonesia. the company has also worked with 400 brands. The company has placed local teams to accelerate business growth.

Similar platforms already exist in Indonesia, including Casting Asia, Narrators, and Influencer Agencies.

“Our monetization strategy is to take commission (service fees) from the results of brand payments to influencers who have participated in our campaign,” Benyamin said.

Series A Investment

This month, Partipost has secured a series A funding worth of US$ 3.5 million, led by SPH Ventures with participation from Quest Ventures and other investors. Furthermore, the company will utilize these fresh funds to develop technology, improve the quality of user experience.

They are targeting to increase brand trust in crowd marketing in the rest of 2020. It is after seeing a lot of potential of crowd marketing to help businesses, the company will also improve services to brands and users. In 2021 Partipost is targeting to gain one million users.

“In addition to strengthening our current operational countries, we will also use this fund to expand our market to other countries, such as Vietnam, the Philippines and Malaysia,” Benyamin said.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

MTARGET Introduces Oneblink to Help SMEs with Online Shopping Page

MTarget, known as a startup that offers marketing solutions and automation tools, has launched Oneblink. A digital platform to help SMEs create pages for their products. The objective is to facilitate business players easy way to show its products to potential customers.

“Oneblink is a tool to create a mini-website for online catalogs and business menu without any difficult coding. It only takes time to register, enter the business links, then publish. Instantly, the digital marketing asset is ready,” MTARGET’s Founder & CEO Yopie Suryadi explained.

He further explained, through Oneblink, users can attach links such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Youtube, Tokopedia, Shopee, Bukalapak, GrabFood, GoFood, and so on. They will also be facilitated to directly choose and buy domains for their business.

“First of all, it’s because of this pandemic. All businesses are being ‘forced’ to go digital. The digital adoption wave that used to be slow, is now getting rapid. It has to be digital or left behind. Also, there are many new businesses that arose during this pandemic. At least they must have a digital identity first. Then, learn how to do ads on social media and understand what to do these ads,” Yopie continued.

Oneblink’s features already exist in the MTARGET platform, however, to reach more users outside the corporation or enterprise MTARGET finally introduces Oneblink as another vertical focused on SMEs.

“Oneblink remains under MTARGET for now. We made this tool so easy that it could become a low-touch SaaS,” Yopi continued.

Oneblink leading feature

The concepts and features in Oneblink are not new. Face to face services like Linktree. However, Yopie is quite optimistic about Oneblink. There are also some excellent features such as unlimited links, domain customization, templates, embedded pixels, analytics, and others.

“[the differentiator] First, of course, local support. Our team is ready to help. Then on this Oneblink template can be sent to other users, therefore, it will open up opportunities for designers to design template services. From the technical side, this landing page builder feature has been very complete,” he explained.

The journey of Oneblink as one of MTARGET products is still long, they said the focus will be on product development and UI / UX, also continue on their mission to help more SMEs go digital.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

Bank Indonesia to Set Standard for Open API, Optimizing Collaboration of Banking and Fintech

Bank Indonesia set the standard for the Open Application Programming Interface (API) to facilitate collaboration between banking and fintech to create an inclusive financial services ecosystem. Open API is an application program that allows companies to be integrated between systems (system to system).

BI’s Director of Payment System Policy Department, Erwin Haryono explained, there would be an agreement and a standardized code by banks and fintech when adopting the Open API standard.

“We want digital transformation in Indonesia to be more integrated. Open API allows banks and fintech to collaborate on data,” Erwin said, as quoted from Katadata.co.id.

The standard is included in the five main central bank initiatives in the blueprint of the Indonesian payment system by 2025. BI is currently refining the stages.

Once released, the application will be performed in stages considering diversity in the payment system industry in Indonesia. This stage will be performed both in terms of the players and the implementation time, considering the size and complexity of the business.

BI considers the Open API standard to improve efficiency in transaction and payment systems. In addition, it is able to increase innovation, competition, and financial inclusion, also reduce and mitigate risk.

Moreover, it is required in the industry, influenced by the rapid digitalization that accelerates the implementation of collaboration between banking and fintech. This is at least reflected in a number of banking corporate actions, which have penetrated the digital banking business model.

Rapid development

Previously, many banks considered opening technology such as API to other companies as forbidden. In fact, this allows the occurrence of moral hazard that could threaten certain aspects of consumer protection. This aspect is a guideline that is always preferred for the financial services industry in running a business.

However, with the rapid technology development, banking is starting to open up. The qualified payment system is required in advancing digital-based businesses, such as e-commerce.

Payment via bank transfers used to be quite popular, but the manual checking process turns out to be a barrier. Finally, due to the rapid development, consumers can top-up electronic money through virtual accounts or NFC in e-commerce applications, also open saving account in non-e-commerce applications.

More banks are opening API services to reach their customers when transacting in various digital applications. It includes BCA, Bank Mandiri, BRI, Bank Danamon, Bank Permata, Bank CIMB, Jenius, Digibank, and many more.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

Bukalapak Launches “Bayar Tempo” PayLater Feature for Small Shops

Bukalapak launches Bayar Tempo Paylater feature for Mitra Bukalapak’s productive financing solutions in developing their businesses. This feature is a result of the company’s collaboration with Indodana’s p2p lending startup.

Bukalapak’s AVP of Investment & Financing Solutions, Dhinda Arisyiya explained, Bayar Tempo provides a credit limit to shop for wholesale products and purchase transactions of virtual products in the Mitra Bukalapak app. Therefore, partners can run operations and have easy transactions even though they are yet to top up the balance.

“We make it easy to use this feature on the main page, balance page, checkout, and payment methods in the Mitra Bukalapak app. Partners can use it repeatedly without limit and to be paid at any time before due date,” he said during an online press conference on Thursday (7/23).

To date, the grocery store entrepreneur is classified as an underbanked with difficulty receiving financial access from financial service institutions. The Bayar Tempo feature is expected to be able to assist them in developing their business without being hampered by burdensome requirements.

This feature is only accessible for 40 thousand selected Mitra Bukalapak joined before last December. Locations are spread in Greater Jakarta, Bandung, Surabaya, Bandung, Gresik, Karawang, and Sidoarjo. Also, the average sales in the application have to be quite active and healthy.

First, before it was official on 10 July, Bukalapak has gathered thousands of Mitra stalls for trial and feedback. Although the number is not stated, the result turns out quite good, it’s 0% failed. The results create confidence in Bukalapak to expand its user base.

The average nominal submitted is IDR 500 thousand, for a 30-day tenor. There is no interest charged, however, there is a service fee per month.

“If partners pay bills before the due date, the limit will return to normal and available to use.”

In terms of submission, partners required to attach a photo ID and selfies with ID cards uploaded in the Mitra Bukalapak application. The verification process only takes a maximum of 1 day or 30 minutes at the fastest.

Indodana

In terms of Indodana, the partnership with Bukalapak is the company’s effort to improve productive loan products in the SME sector. To date, the distribution of funding in this sector has reached 30% of its portfolio.

“We are very proud to launch Bayar Tempo with one of the best e-commerce platforms in Indonesia focused on local SME productivity,” Indodana’s Head of Business Development Timothy Prawiromaruto said.

Bukalapak selected with Indodana because the startup had obtained an official permit from the OJK and had the same vision in developing micro-businesses through quality financing.

Indodana also runs a paylater product to provide online shopping convenience. They have worked with online merchants and e-money players in developing the product.

According to the company’s internal statistics, the Indodana application has been downloaded by more than 3 million users throughout Indonesia. To date, they have distributed around 1 trillion Rupiah to 30 thousand customers, both for personal and SME borrowers. Indodana alone provides loans between 1-8 million Rupiahs with a tenor of 3-6 months.

This startup is affiliated with the Cermati financial product aggregator. One of Cermati’s Co-Founders, Carlo Gandasubrata, serves as a commissioner in Indodana. Also, the operational office located at the same address as Cermati.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

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Sorabel Closes Down Business Operation by the End of July 2020

Sorabel’s fashion e-commerce startup will permanently shut down effective as of July 30, 2020. This one adds up to the list of startups out of business due to the impact of the co-19 pandemic.

In a copy of the letter received by DailySocial, sent by Sorabel’s lead to employees, it is said that the company has done its best to save the business. However, with a heavy heart must take the liquidation route.

Liquidation is the a company dismissal by a liquidator, as well as the settlement by selling company assets, collecting receivables, paying off debts, and settling the remaining assets or debts to the involved parties .

“Through the liquidation process, the employment relationship should end as of now for everyone without exception, effective on July 30, 2020. I am sure that no one expects this to happen,” the letter said.

Management ensures that employee rights in connection with this liquidation, including holiday allowances, will be complied as part of the company’s debt. It is also certain, the company will be subject to the liquidation process and the liquidator’s decision in accordance with the provisions of law and legislation.

Therefore, employees are expected to return all company assets (for resale) and process them by the liquidator. The management also guarantees with a network of more than 10 investors and over 100 companies, they will be fully supported to get a replacement job.

“Maybe this is the end of our journey with Sorabel. I hope our friends can keep in mind the good memory we have shared together here. […] The company would like to thank as much as possible for fighting together up to this point,” he concluded.

Before its official shutdown, Sorabel’s business unit in the Philippines under the Yabel brand announced its closure on their social media accounts as of February.

Sorabel’s journey

The company was founded in 2014 with the brand Sale Stock, before rebranding into Sorabel. The journey is quite long with a variety of succeeding innovations in introducing themselves to consumers who have never shopped online, one is through the feature “Try It First and Pay.”

The company also took efficiency steps by reducing around 200 employees in 2016. Despite the decision, it was not long for them to raise Series B + funding led by Meranti ASEAN Growth Fund. Based on iPrice’s data, the company has around 375 employees per second quarter of 2020.

Sorabel’s Co-Founder, Lingga Madu once said that their company’s business model is the healthiest compared to other e-commerce players in Indonesia, even claimed to have reached break-even point (BEP) in 2018 and is ready to make a profit. He aligned Sorabel’s economics unit with overseas e-commerce fashion players such as Asos and Revolve.

Sorabel’s journey became more aggressive after rebranding in early last year. The company started expanding to realize its ambition to provide access to quality fashion and affordable prices for “next billion users.” Yabel was a proof of the company’s ambitions, they even planning to enter the Middle East and the United Arab Emirates area.

As per the last interview with DailySocial, the company was processing series C funding, which was followed by Kejora Ventures and Ncore Ventures. Some other previous investors also participated, such as OpenSpace, Shift, Gobi Partners, MNC Media Investment, SMDV, Golden Equator Capital, and Convergence Ventures.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian

Kiddo Bags Seed Funding from OCBC NISP Ventura

In order to strengthen its position as an edutech platform for children (5-12 years), Kiddo technology startups officially announce seed funding from OCBC NISP Ventura. The value is undisclosed. Previously, Kiddo was selected by the Ministry of Research and Technology / BRIN as one of the technology startups to receive grant funding and business training in Armenia and London.

“Indonesia will be one hundred years old by 2045 and one-third of Indonesia’s population is currently aged 0-12 years, twenty-five years from now will be at the peak of productive working age. They are the next generation leaders, and this is the best moment to help them optimize their potential to compete in the global industry,” Kiddo.id’s Co-Founder and CEO, Analia Tan said.

Launched in early 2020, OCBC NISP Ventura is an OCBC NISP’s corporate venture capital (CVC). Head of Strategy & Innovation at OCBC NISP, Ka Jit told DailySocial that this CVC aims to create a digital ecosystem to drive the transformation of the banking sector. The 400 billion Rupiah funds are prepared as authorized capital, with 99.9% ownership by Bank OCBC NISP.

“We established OCBC NISP Ventura to create transformative value by utilizing Indonesia’s entrepreneurial potential and startup spirit with an extensive banking network to answer the evolving needs of the community,” Ka Jit said.

Positive growth during the pandemic

Last May, Kiddo had formed a strategic partnership with GogoKids from Malaysia. Through this collaboration, users can take online classes from both countries. Providers of child activity services from Indonesia can also market their classes broadly to Malaysian customers.

During the post-pandemic situation, Kiddo presented a selection of quality activities for Indonesian children. The current classes can still be practiced virtually and booked through the platform. Kiddo has partnered with more than hundreds of child service providers in several major cities in Indonesia. To date, hundreds of activity providers have joined the platform.

“We want to provide more children activities options for Indonesian parents that suit their children’s needs to develop their potential while at home #dirumahaja. On the other hand, we also want to help providers of children’s activities in Indonesia through this partnership to expand their business to the Malaysian market,” Analia said.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian