BukuWarung, Indonesia’s accounting app for micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs), on Tuesday announced that it raised a seed funding round led by East Ventures. The newly established AC Ventures, Golden Gate Ventures, Tanglin Venture Partners, and Michael Sampoerna also joined the round with strategic angel investors from Grab, Gojek, Flipkart, PayPal, Xendit, Rapyd, Alterra, and ZEN Rooms.
No financial details were disclosed, but the Jakarta-based company said it will utilize the fresh investment to strengthen its presence and expand its team to grow across engineering, product, design, and partnerships. The startup was founded by two former Carousell executives, Abhinay Peddisetty and Chinmay Chauhan.
BukuWarung helps MSMEs to digitize their bookkeeping, allowing them to manage and track down their finances more conveniently. Founded in 2019, the firm has already registered millions of credit and cash transactions by more than 250,000 MSMEs across more than 500 cities and towns in Indonesia, according to an official statement.
Most merchant users come from outside metro cities. With the app they can achieve faster credit repayments and an improved cashflow through automated payment reminders. BukuWarung believes that merchants will save money and time by switching to digital bookkeeping.
Indonesian SMEs are going digital
According to data by the ministry of cooperatives and SMEs, there are more than 60 million SMEs in Indonesia in 2019, and the government is encouraging them to adopt technology in order to accelerate their businesses.
Other tech platforms dedicated to upgrade small kiosks are WarungPintar and GrabKios by Kudo, both also backed by East Ventures. Indonesia’s e-commerce unicorns Tokopedia and Bukalapak provide similar support, through their small shop programs Mitra Tokopedia and Mitra Bukalapak.
BukuWarung further said it will launch features that reduce potential exposure to COVID-19, by adding payment links to major digital wallets. Beyond that, the firm has partnered with telehealth companies to create awareness for the virus.